Hey everyone today I'm going to talk about my trip to Morocco and give you
some advice that hopefully helps you prepare for your trip to Morocco!
One
thing that helped me was I brought index cards and on each card I would write the
address at the hostel or hotel that I was staying at so this helped me
communicate with the driver where I wanted to go.
If you do have time before
your trip I would suggest learning a little bit of French because a lot of
the people there spoke French more than they did
Arabic or if they spoke Arabic it was a Moroccan version so that would be a
little bit hard for you to learn, possibly.
So I would suggest learning
French or downloading Google Translate on your phone and downloading the French
version on your phone.
You can also download offline
maps before you go.
I'm not sure if you're gonna be having data when you go
there, but there's Maps.Me and some other options for you so that you can
download maps that have them on your phone even if you don't have data.
Definitely pack any toiletry products that you need beforehand it was hard for
me to find hair conditioner and contact eye solution, so these are things
that you're gonna want to pack beforehead when figuring out what to pack.
For clothing I would definitely suggest packing things that are more modest and
I have a whole video about what to pack and what to wear in Morocco.
Here are
some things to keep in mind when you're there that will hopefully help you
during your trip.
When you're using taxis make sure that it's an official taxi
driver and taxi car that you're getting into
and then each taxi driver should
have a meter. A lot of times they pretend like they don't or they don't want to
tell tourists this because they want to overcharge you, so you can ask if they
have a meter and this will be a cheaper price then they're gonna try and charge
you.
If you are gonna negotiate a price make sure that you talk about prices
before you actually drive anywhere because what can happen is you can go
somewhere and then they're gonna try and charge you a ridiculous price when you
get there and then you're kind of stuck.
So try and do the negotiation before the
ride or right when you get in.
If you are worried about this you can have your
hotel call the taxi for you so that you have a fixed price before going and this
might be a little bit more expensive then you can negotiate by yourself
effectively but definitely cheaper than what they're probably gonna try to
overcharge you.
Another strange thing about taxis is sometimes they already have
passengers in them, but you can still call them over and you'll get in with
the locals.
When in Morocco, try and have a lot of small bills that you can use
because a lot of places will not have change.
So if you give them a big bill they
won't have the change and you'll end up getting overcharged for a lot of things.
In Marrakech you're gonna see a lot of people that have animals that want you
to take photos with them and want your money.
And I'm going to tell you story
about this and I want you to learn from my mistakes.
First of all I didn't know
how horribly these animals are treated so
definitely don't support them. They they're terrible to the animals and it's
a very bad cycle, but putting that aside, what happened was I wanted to take a
photo with the with the snake charmers and so basically what happened was I got
my photos and that was cool, but then after he asked for some money. I gave
some money and it wasn't good enough andso he proceeded to yell at me that he
wanted more money. So I really believe that whatever I had given him wasn't
gonna be enough so they can get very very pushy about it.
So once I got
out of this basically I just gave him the money and walked away.
The monkey guys threw a monkey on me and basically didn't even ask if I
wanted a photo with the monkey just threw the monkeys on me, and then the
same thing happened. I gave them money and that wasn't good enough so this guy
actually wouldn't let me go. He even tried to grab my camera out of my hand
saying that I needed to delete the photo. And so he was following me and my
friends because I wouldn't give him enough money and I had to pop into a
store to escape from him and he was still waiting outside the store and he
didn't leave us alone until one of my guy friends basically had to go up to
him and yell at him.
So just be very careful with this, whatever money you
give them isn't gonna be enough and they can just throw the animals on you so just
be very very pushy and say no I don't want my photo and stick to that.
One thing that you're definitely gonna find in Morocco, especially in the markets is
a lot of unwanted help.
If you look lostat all people are gonna come up to you
and try and help you and this might be out of genuineness but more likely
they're trying to get you to either go to their shop or they're trying to show
you where to go and then expect a tip so just be wary of this before if someone's
coming up to you and talking to you.
When getting water, definitely go to the
supermarkets it's gonna be the cheapest way to get your water rather than at the
touristy places, where they're gonna try and overcharge you for water and definitely
at the restaurants as well.
I would suggest not brushing your teeth with the
water there. Some people will say don't drink the water,
people will go as far as saying don't brush your teeth or don't even order
juices or smoothies with water in them. That kind of depends on how risky you
want to get, but you might as well be safe than sorry and not brush your teeth
with the water because you don't want to get sick later.
That being said you
probably will get sick while you're there so be sure to bring some stomach
pills because the food can get spicy and it might not be what you're used to.
The food can also be quite repetitive. I really did enjoy the food when I was
there but to be honest almost every restaurant was very very similar so
that's just something that maybe to know beforehand so you can at least expect
that.
Delicious food but it got very repetitive for me.
On Fridays a lot of
the restaurants will have couscous Fridays where basically they offer couscous
and it's pretty cheap so I definitely recommend that because I love the
couscous there and it's a good deal as well.
In general, Morocco is a lot more
expensive than I had anticipated. It's becoming a lot more touristy so a
lot of the restaurants are more expensive. I think I paid about ten
dollars a meal on average which I thought was kind of a lot. You can
definitely go cheaper or more expensive depending on how much you order but in
general I would say try and save more money than your and bring more money
than you anticipate.
Definitely try and pack light and leave a lot of room in
your suitcase. There are so many great markets with things to buy so you're
definitely going to want to go shopping there so bring a lot of extra space!
So one thing that you really need to be careful of in Morocco is taking photos
of people and videos of people. And of course this is something that I did a
lot because I was vlogging there and people can get very upset when you take
their photo. Obviously you know it can be rude to just stick a camera in someone's
face so I totally understand that, but people can get almost aggressive about
it so you really need to be careful with this. This happened to me a couple
different times. The worst time for me was when I was taking photos and videos
in a market and there was a man who's a butcher and he didn't want his photo
taken and I actually wasn't even taking his photo,
but he thought I was because I had my camera everywhere. And so he pointed to
the sign that said no photos and then proceeded to yell at me about how he
didn't want his photo taken and and this went on for a while and then my tour
guide stepped in and then started to yell back and they got into a very
heated argument about this and I was just standing there because I hadn't
even taken a photo. And somebody pointed out later to me that he had a knife so
just be careful with the photos thing if you're gonna do it just be discreet or
even better much better is to ask for permission.
Also with photos make sure you never ever take a photo or video or even put
your camera up around a military officer police officer or anyone with the
government. I actually think it's either illegal or they get very very mad
so either way it's not worth the risk. Just make sure if you're at a palace or
you see anyone in the military or government do not take a photo of them.
If you're nervous about coming to Morocco and you just don't even know
where to start I would suggest looking at Marrakech because it's so touristy
that if you go there you'll find other tourists and there are a ton of tour
companies that can help you plan trips and things like that and it's you won't
be feel alone there. So I think that would be a good start if you just have
no idea where to start.
Let me know if you have any questions, be sure to
comment them below and be sure to subscribe for more travel videos in
Morocco and around the world and I'll see you next week!