Argan oil and (too) old culture

The tour picks us up at 7.30 and we head towards the mountains. The mountains are unexpected but beautiful and even have snow on the top at 2500m. We take a break and there are at least 5 souvenir stands. Something that's gonna follow us. But the views were beautiful! The next stop is at resting area. Although it's a combination of an argan oil seed shop, a cafe and rest rooms. Of course there are three women (only women can do it) in the entrance opening the seeds and grinding the oil for the whole shop. There are probably people who still believe these stories. But we are not forced to buy anything, there were bread samples with argan oil (and with almond paste because of course argan oil with bread is not the best breakfast) and free toilets, so overall not too bad. There are three older latin women on board who are always late and bring some entertainment as we later knew. The next stop is to get some lunch, we stop at the most expensive restaurant (14€ a soup and a tajine) and of course the discussions begin why they drop us of there. I think if they drop us off in expensive restaurants and the tour company gets a percentage, or if the tour company drops us off in a cheaper place but charge more for the tour itself, it comes out to the same. After the lunch we visit the unesco world heritage site of the ancient city Ait Ben Haddou. Various films with a big name were filmed here. We get a local guide and walk trough the city, the guide explains the fortification system of the city to us. Very interesting is the technique they used to paint images and maps. They use only 4 colours but they add sugar and burn it afterwards to tone the colours. And the first sunburn comes free for the German winter skin. At the end of the day we stay in a decent hotel with a swimming pool, food and another tajine for dinner. After the dinner we go to the hotel bar with the 3 older Latin women. In the bar there are only some local older man which were staring intensively (still underestimated). I was surprised that they didn't offer some goats or cows to marry them. At this point it occurred in our minds that the only working women we have seen so far were 2 women in the airport. Afterwards not a single one.Read more