Essaouira: Day 2

Our second day in Essaouira began with a trip to the famous "castle in the sand," Borj el Berod. This ruined watchtower, located a mile or so south down the beach from Essaouira, was built in the 18th century over the ruins of a much older fort--possibly Phonecian, as the Iles Purpuraires, where the famous imperial purple dye for the Roman Empire was made, lie directly opposite. The tower collapsed in the 19th century after a flood and now all that's left is a pile of enormous stones in the middle of the beach. 

Local legend holds that the Jimi Hendrix song "Castles Made of Sand" is based on the old fort. Hendrix is so popular here that even the bedroom decor in our Essaouira apartment is an obvious homage--framed photos above the headboard, psychedelic tapestries and rugs. As fun as it is to talk about, this particular tall tale is almost certainly not true, as Hendrix only visited Morocco two years after the song had already been released. 

Borj El Berod is only accessible at low tide: during the rest of the day it's visible but surrounded by water. To make sure we didn't miss the opportune moment, we took an early cab down the beach to the closest drop-off point and walked the rest of the way with a canine escort (Rachael is finding it difficult not to pet all the cute, mangy stray things here). It may be a ruin, but the remaining stones are massive! And very climbable. We stuck around until the tide started to come in and threaten to trap us there, and then walked back along the beach and into town. 

After a quick lunch, it was back to the souks! We wiled the afternoon away browsing stalls full of fragrant argan oil, chunky silver jewelry, colorful woven blankets, dreamy brass lanterns, dainty slippers, and...carpets.  More on that later.

On our way home, we picked up a takeaway dinner (and thereby avoided the do-we-eat-in-public-before-7:45pm dilemma) from a shawarma stand. We had passed this guy many times over the last two days and his street-side stand looked super popular. He had a pretty steady stream of tourists and expats during the day, but was insanely busy for the hour or so before the fast broke. He joked easily with all his customers, who seemed like regulars-turned-friends, and we also noticed he would often flag down passersby he knew for a hug or a handshake. This guy knew everyone, and everyone knew him. That seemed like a pretty good recommendation to us, so we decided to depart from what we traditionally thought qualified as Moroccan food in favor of what the Moroccans actually seemed to be eating!

Our order was interrupted several times by a shout to a friend in the street, and Rachael told the shawarma man that it seemed like he must know everyone in Essaouira, and he laughed.  "Everyone in Essaouira is my friend, and I have friends all over the world! From France, from Australia, from Italy, from England, from Spain. Why do I need to travel to see the world? The world comes to me!" As we waited for our food, we took a closer look at the sign on his shop and noticed he didn't just make shawarma, but also crepes, panini, tacos, burgers, pizza, kofta, chicken nuggets...the list went on! We scanned the enormous menu incredulously, wondering if there was any region's food he did not make (the answer is Eastern Asia). We commented on this, and again the shawarma/crepe/panini/etc. man laughed. "I am the man who cooks every food for people from everywhere without going anywhere!"