Sick Again!

A bee in my coke


The showers at my hotel are in a central location, not in the individual rooms, and they only have hot water for 2 hours every morning. I woke up with 2 minutes left so I quickly stripped, grabbed my towel and ran to the showers. I was lucky and there was an empty shower, I jumped in and was able to enjoy a hot, luke warm, shower the entire time I was in there.

On my flight from Abu Dhabi, I sat next to a Moroccan kid who suggested places that I visit and one of them was Chefchaouen, my destination for the day. The only way to get to Chefchaouen was to go through Tangier and then through Tetouan. Getting a grande taxi to Tangier was easy and fast enough. When I got to Tangier I asked where the line for Grande Taxi’s to Tetouan was and was told there isn’t really a line. There is no order like all the other Grande Taxi stands. What people would do is crowd around the gate and wait for a taxi to pull in and then ask the driver where he was going next and people would fight their way in if it was there they wanted to go. I didn’t want to do this, I would feel bad throwing an old lady to the ground and got lucky in finding people who were also going to Tetouan and we were able to hire a driver on our own, so we didn’t have to fight. Then when I got to Tetouan I was told that there were 2 Grande Taxi stands in town and I was at the wrong one, so I had to take a petite taxi to the other Grande Taxi stand, where I was able to get a ride to Chefchaouen. It was much more complicated than necessary and I was lucky to have the help of several people.

When I reached Chefchaouen I wandered around town to find the old medina and then once I found it I went from hotel to hotel on my list looking for a place with vacancies. When I had been in central morocco finding a hotel was easy and they were often vacant, it seems that northern morocco is much more crowded this time of year, especially from the Spanish. I intend to head to Spain within the week and start my European adventures there. I had difficulty finding a hotel on my own and finally accepted the help of one of the many young men in town with awfully dirty teeth. Its almost like a sign, the dirtier the teeth, the more likely they are trying to sell you something or get money from you. I went to several hotels that had single rooms left but they were all very musty, dirty and under staircases. Once I found a hotel with a nice guy at the counter and a sufficient room, I tried to pay the guy who helped me find the hotel, but all he wanted was for me to buy some hashish from him. This part of the country is famous for their hashish and something like 40% of Europe’s hashish comes from here.

My room smells like semen and both the door and window only open into the building preventing a breeze from coming and clearing out the smell. I decided to investigate to see if I could find the source, better to suffer through one strong undesirable whiff then to suffer all night. First I checked the unemptied trash can, it was not the source it smelled of plastic and stale only. Next I tried the thick blanket at the foot of the bed, it only smelt like wet dog. The comforter? No, that only smells like urine. The sheet, pillow and mattress all only smell of must. I looked under the bed, the only place anything could hide and there was nothing. I don’t know where the smell is coming from. I will be switching hotels in the morning, even if that means I have to leave the town.

I wrote the above entry on Sunday and since then I have switched hotels and have mostly been laying in bed with an upset stomach and everything that usually accompanies them. I am feeling somewhat better today and hope to be better by tomorrow so I can explore the area around Chefchaouen and then I will most likely head to Tangier to take the boat to Spain before the week is out.

Pictures from today's adventures