Sun, 4/20/25    Casablanca

Day 104 - Sunday, April 20th, 2025 – Casablanca, Morocco

We had a 10 o’clock pick up. We got out there shortly before. It happened to be about 60 and raining a little. I was not happy with the start of the day. We were quickly met by Wahbi and Hasan. We did introductions and they loaded me into the van. It was lift equipped. Getting in the back door I had to twist my head a little bit, but I fit. We got through the multiple layers of security to get to the public streets. Security was really tight at least near the port. In round the port there happened to be port security, local police, and would appear to be military carrying machine guns. After we got out of the port area we still saw a lot of police and the occasional military but not nearly as heavy as down near the port.  Along the way to the Hassan II Mosque, Whabi discussed several of the things we were passing. Of course, I don’t remember them now. When we got to the mosque itself, it was odd at best. They had this huge tower attached to this huge building that sat on this huge wide open tile space. Hopefully the pictures will justify this. Everything was just huge. We made it through the ticket area and walked across the open tile area. It had to be a quarter of a mile before we reaching the actual building. Once we were inside the building, without exaggeration, you could fit an entire American football field inside of it. It was a huge stone structure. Obviously, this is where the people of Casablanca went to pray. The city has 8 million people of which the majority are Muslim. I didn’t completely understand how often they came to this mosque to do their praying, but the mosque could accomadate half the town.

We learned that only men can pray on the first floor. Women could only pray on the floor above. Before they could go to their respective floors, everyone had to go to the basement to go through a specific cleaning process which meant washing their arms, hands, legs, and feet before going to their respective floor. While Mary toured the upstairs and downstairs, I got to push in the open football field. It was on marble so pushing was easy. Most people would go there to pray, I would go there to push. I wonder if anyone would care. Did they keep an eye open so I could push while they were praying. Do you think anyone would mind?

The next praying session started at about 1:30 so we were shooed out of the building by about 1 o’clock. Back outside, we took more pictures. This huge building sits right on the Atlantic Ocean. Off to the distance there was a lighthouse. There were two other buildings that sat on this huge site. One was a library and the other was the museum. We chose not to go into the museum. An interesting fact is that throughout this entire complex there are water fountains that were turned off because of the lack of water. I can only imagine what it would be like to have fountains here and there throughout this entire space. Mary tells me that the same was true with the fountains in Barcelona. They’ve had fountains that have not been turned on in 2 1/2 years because of the lack of water there too.

We drove for a while until we hit two beaches. At one, we got out and we walked for a while. Whabi suggested that we stop in a specific spot and get a Moroccan tea. There was some communication breakdown because he only wanted us to get tea. We ended up ordering a sandwich which took forever. We ended up bringing the sandwich home in a bag. The Moroccan tea was good. It had a very spearmint-like taste to it. It was too sweet for me. I think Mary liked it because it was sweet. Anyway, after the miscommunication on the sandwich, we loaded back up into the van and headed towards Old Medina. At one point, we got out of the van and went into a mall area. The mall area is called Mohammed 5 square. This is where we found a vendor who had T-shirts, refrigerator, magnet, postcards. We walked further through this market, and we ended up at what he called the fruit market. It was a room of maybe 50 x 50 with nothing but huge barrels of olives, olive oil, and other cured vegetables. For example, I picked up some cured artichoke carts. I haven’t tasted them yet, but I’m assuming they are in olive oil. (We are and they were actually packed and they salt water which gave them an odd taste – damn.) I also had some shredded vegetable mix that was in salt water. This was actually really good. I tested probably eat different olives. I was surprised that they were that different. I ended up buying two or three different types. I will have to eat them before we get home. I’ve eaten more olives in one day than I had eaten in my entire life put together. I haven’t gotten to this part yet, but the dinner we go too shortly also had olives. I told Mary tonight if I get the shakes. It’s because I didn’t get my olive fix. We then drove to a square where Mary got out and I stayed in. She took several pictures.

With then drove a short while before we were stopped in front of the restaurant where we were to have a Moroccan dinner. The restaurant was called Restaurant les fleurs. We were seated at a table. We were given menus that had some English on them, but not enough to really know what you were ordering. I felt it was like a game. Order in the dark. It was suggested that we stick to things that said Moroccan in front of them. So we tried the Moroccan soup. We both got a bowl. Because we were feeling adventurous, I had Tagine fish and Mary had Chicken couscous. We both loved the soup. We learned later it had a lamb base. What else was in it? I think it was one of those things that if they told you they had to shoot you. Either that or no one has a clue what goes in there except what’s left in the refrigerator at the end of the day. Anyway, it was very good. My fish dish was good. It was a big piece of some type of white fish buried in slow cooked vegetables. It has some spices on it that I could never tell what they were. Mary’s chicken was very good. Apparently, they only sell the couscous on Friday so we got away with something against the law. Just don’t tell anybody.

After dinner, we loaded back up into the car. We drove a short while to wear we found stamps. Mary bought stamps and put the cards in the mail. While they were there, they also found a wine store where we picked up two bottles of wine. Now we have wine from Morocco. Hopefully it’ll make it home. They got back in the car, and we drove a short while further to where we found the mail order store. Mary is on the hunt for bubble wrap so she can wrap the wine bottles so we can bring them home. She was successful in that she found several pieces of bubble wrap which we purchased. Right now. Someone asks, “What did you do in Casablanca?” We can say, “Bought bubble wrap.” We got back in the car. We drove back to the ship.

The evening before we got to Casablanca we received a letter under the door saying that they were going to be protests in the area. We should be aware and that the protests would start around 5:30. As it turns out we were coming back to the ship around 5:30. You could see both sides getting ready. There were countless police people with their vests, machine guns, etc. You could also see lots of people in large groups. As it turns out, it was a very peaceful protest, thankfully. We did the right thing by getting in early because they were going to close streets and we didn’t know how we would get in if they closed streets, etc. So, we made it to the ship. We said our goodbyes. They went their way, and we tried to get into the ship with our multitudes of things.

Back in the room we spent the rest of the evening resting and doing whatever else we wanted to do. It had been a long and successful day.

Casablanca is a very interesting city. It is the first time we’ve been to a Muslim Mosque. I would have to say it was impressive. As far as the city goes, it is a huge huge city with 8 million people in it. We saw a tiny sliver. The tiny silver we saw was all good. Like every big city, I’m sure there were not good areas. Our tour guide would not take us to those areas. Nor, did we want to see those areas. I would be interested to come back at some point. It’s a whole different culture. Probably more different than we’ve ever seen, in my opinion. I’d come back. I think Mary would.