Our time in Essaouira is winding down – we need to get on up the road and see some more of what looks to be a terribly interesting country.  We had a nice sunset dinner at Ocean Vagabond on Friday night – not much else to report from Friday.  Dinner was pasta for Sandy and pizza for me.  The restaurant is right on the beach and we had a really nice view of the sunset – along with some camels out on the beach for people to hire for rides. We opted out – we hope to do that a little later in Morocco.

We’ve been holding off watching the movie, Casablanca, together until we got to Morocco.  We ended up starting that on Friday night but only made it halfway through before we needed to call it a night.

On Saturday, we headed back to Fitness Club to get another workout in.  We had been walking past a café called SanBurZa that we decided, we just have to stop and eat – it smells so good every time we go by.  They have their meat – usually chicken – on a rotisserie and it always looks so good.  We weren’t disappointed.  Friendly service and the following food was consumed (almost all of it anyway) for a whopping $12: two chicken shawarmas, a chef’s salad, a quarter chicken with fries and small salad, a basket of bread, and gratuity.  It’s taking us time to realize that when something costs $3, it doesn’t mean that it is a small quantity.  We definitely over-ordered.  We’ll probably be somewhere a year from now reading this and reminiscing about the great value we are getting here in Morocco.

Our little hometown of Essaouira happened to be celebrating the 20^th edition of its spring classical music festival this last weekend while we are here.  The festival brings in classical music performers and there are performances in various spots around the city.  There is no charge for the events.  Pretty good deal.  We selected two events, both on Saturday.  One was a trio performing two pieces by Brahms – the first piece was only the piano and cello, the second piece added the violin.  It took place in the Dar Souiri Cultural Center – in a domed courtyard.  It was a beautiful performance.

In between this one and our evening performance, we went to a bakery and had another of the gazelle horns and another chocolate peanut butter ball.  I needed to get a little more of the chocolate ice cream so I took care of that.  Then we relaxed and read at the apartment. Sandy listened to Taylor Swift’s new album.

We enjoyed another sunset from the rooftop of the apartment building and then it was back to the festival. The evening performance was the Moroccan Philharmonic Orchestra. I didn’t count the members, but there had to be around 60 members and it was a night of powerful performances.  Loved watching the conductor.

I had the pleasure of sitting next to a young man named Omar. He is a 20-year old university student studying AI and cyber-security.  Essaouira is his hometown and his pride for his town and his country was so evident in our conversations.  He was kind enough to translate for us a little of what was happening.  He pointed out some of the dignitaries in attendance – one of the king’s advisers and also the mayor of Essaouira.  I really enjoyed talking with Omar.  What a fun night we had at the festival.

We have a bus scheduled tomorrow to leave Essaouira so we walked by the bus stop today to make sure we knew where to go tomorrow morning.  Since it was our last day here, we knew we wanted to meander through the Medina and also relax back at Mogador Nights with some mint tea.  We were a little hungry so we shared a chicken tajine.  After more Medina wandering, we each had a crepe – I had peanut butter and banana one (I’m an Elvis fan) and Sandy had a chocolate one.  We then walked the beach front one last time together back to the apartment.  I watched the Lightning/Panthers game (sadly, the Lightning lost and are down 1-0 in the series) while Sandy talked with her friend, Sarah, and then she went for a 30-minute walk along the beach.  It’s moving day tomorrow, so we got ourselves packed up and ready to go in the morning.