Chefchaouen

The main takeaways from our visit to Chefchaouen are:

Chefchaouen is a city in Northwest Morocco nestled up against the Rif mountains. Its nickname is the blue pearl of Morocco.  We arrived late in the afternoon of December 6, 2019.  Our driver had called ahead as two porters met us to take our luggage up (way up) to our lodging.  On the right you can see me half way up during our long climb to our ryad, which was in the heart of the medina.

After the climb to our room we were greeted with tea and cakes in the lobby of our Ryad.  The restful interlude became more essential when we realized that our room was another 44 steps up.  The room was worth it as it was easily the nicest one we had in Morocco.

We had already just about had enough steps and climbs for one day, but we did venture up a few more steps to get some photo ops from the roof.  

In the night shot of Chefchaouen is a view of one of the many mosques throughout Morocco.

After a wonderful breakfast at our Ryad, we met Renay Weir for our photo tour of the city.  Renay Weir is originally from Australia. After traveling around Morocco, she settled in Chefchaouen and founded The Chaouen Insider.  We hired her to guide us to the best photo ops in the town.  Anyone visiting Chefchaouen should definitely contact her first at Thechaoueninsider.com.  Here are some of the over 200 images we took of this picturesque  city.

The square in the photo on the left is an evening gathering place for the men of the community.  They enjoy each others company while puffing on their favorite inhalant.

The proprietor of one of the shops on the square shows an Italian soap opera during the gathering.  Neither he or any of the audience know Italian.  He then narrates the story making it up for entertainment as it goes along.

The students are on the left.  Above is our instructor teaching us how to make 3 variations of taktouka, which is a Moroccan cooked salad.  This dish is typically eaten as a starter in Morocco.  Below is our dinner on the stove.  Along with the taktouka are the main course in the tajines.  One had beef with onions.  The other had lemon chicken.  Our favorite was the lemon chicken.

<------- Lemon Chicken