Chefchaouen

We left yesterday (Saturday) morning for Chefchaouen.  It's a four hour bus ride.  The bus was very nice (heated!) and it stopped at a restaurant at the half-way point.  There was a woman selling Moroccan pancakes with honey  Valeria and I split one.  We got to Chefchaouen around noon.  We found a cheap and fairly nice hotel.  Valeria and I shared a room.  There were two bathrooms on that floor, but the shower was icy cold along with the room (2 blankets helped).  We did quite a bit of climbing.  Chefchaouen is in the Rif mountains.  Its name means horns in Berber because of the shape of the mountains behind it.  It was founded by Jews in 1471 when they were fleeing Spain.  Now all the Jews have gone to New York and Israel (according to a Moroccan carpet merchant).  The buildings are all painted blue.  Apparently, they were originally painted blue by the Jews because of something in the bible, but Nathan's explanation (one of my traveling companions) was that perhaps one day they were all sitting around stoned on hashish and said, "Hey, let's paint the whole town blue."  Anyway, it is very interesting to look at.  It's a maze of little streets.  They are all paved with cobblestones and painted blue.  None of the streets in the center of town are wide enough for even a mini-cooper.  They are also quite steep.  Kids run up and down them and I kept wondering how many skinned knees they end up with.  We did lots of climbing.  Everywhere you go, you can climb up and see a beautiful view.  Also, it's very close to Tangier and Spain, so lots of Spanish tourists come there during the summer.  We would ask questions in French and people would answer us in Spanish. 
 I bought two berber carpets!  They are being shipped.

1: our bus   2: our hotel  3: a street with kids playing   4: man in bus station (LOTS of Berbers wearing jelabas with hoods up here)   5: a little shop