The 48 travellers to Morocco - there and back in 9 days - had a wonderful time together - and not a cross word from any one.!! It was the four star hotels in this country and the five star hotels across the water that we will remember.
The Moroccan Hotels were ostentatiously exotic - acres and acres of space without signs to this or that. Fleecy soft white towelling dressing gowns, candelabras that wouldn't disgrace a palace, King size beds, even for singleton's, carpets, pictures, sculptures, bathrooms etc- you think of it, these hotels had it. The catering didn't always live up to the standards of the decor. (In general it was totally acceptable - just one hotel which really let us down).The tour took us to the important Cities of Morocco - Fes. Marrakech, Casablanca, Rabat and Tangiers - where we visited the medina's (old city centres made of narrow twisting dark and exciting streets lined with every sort of shop imaginable). The contrast between the opulence of the hotels, the apparent high standard of living of the city people (excluding those in the rabbit warrens of the medina's) and those in the countryside will never be forgotten. The contrast was emphasized indelibly because we spent a day driving across the country in a continuous deluge which churned the road sides/foot paths in front of the tented shops (and homes) into thick unwelcoming mud. Horrific. Truly horrific. And away from the roadside villages, where were the people walking and walking? In the mud too. From nowhere to nowhere - or so it appeared to us.
Rabat - the capital of the country - was voted the place we most wanted to return too. We received a delightful impression of it. But then Granada when we returned to Spain made us very welcome and it was glorious to drive through km after km of snow. We had been lucky with the weather - apart from the one day of rain when we were in the coach. It was cold to begin with, then that rain, and then glorious sunshine.