Ouzoud

 Today we hiked to Ouzoud Falls along a trail along a ridge filled with almond and olive groves, seeing pistachio and pomegranate on our way. We then descended down to the river, where there were small cafes, counter culture communities, and camping areas. The river is silty because of rain last week.

These are a Moroccan version of “spoons” or castanets, that were on display in a cafe. We have seen all the Berber musicians playing them, but this was our first opportunity to play them.

Next we came to the falls. Our guide asked us if we wanted to cross by boat or the bridge. We weren’t particularly interested in the boat, but it turned out that the “bridge” was actually rock hopping, which wasn’t exactly our definition of a bridge. 

This is the boat choice, which we didn’t take.

Everything you see in the picture is part of the falls when it rains.

We had lunch overlooking the falls. This is one of the restaurant employees, a blue man, in charge of the tagines (stews).

We had a donkey come through the restaurant during lunch.

On the way back up from the river, we passed by a colony of Barbary apes, which are really monkeys.

Our final adventure later that evening was that after our hike earlier in the day in 90 degree weather, we thought a beer sounded really good. We passed a giant luxury hotel on our walk in the morning, and our guide mentioned that they had beer. Naturally, our ears perked up. We thought we remembered where the hotel was. We eventually found it. It was perched high on the cliff overlooking the falls. We walked in and they asked us if we had a reservation. We said that no, but we would like a beer. They looked at us like we were from Mars, but said that we could buy a beer. Then they had to find someone to get a beer for us. They put us in a sort of library room that did have a bar, which they called the American Bar. We wanted to have our beer on the terrace overlooking the falls. They said no, we had to have it in the American Bar. Then someone came in later, and said they would break the rules, and we could have it on the terrace. So in the end, it was a beer with a great view. Some Israeli tourists came out, and joined us, which made it fun. In the end, it was hard to pay because we weren’t hotel guests, but they took our money at reception. 

We later walked to a local restaurant our guide recommended, and had a lovely walk back to our hotel.