Friday, November 13, 2009

Red Tourist Bus, Cyber Parc, Jardin Majorelle (Part Deux)

Hazel and I played tourist this week, took the red bus tour of Marrakech, double-decker and open-roofed. Made it part way out ("I WANN TO GET OFF!!!") then had to take a petit taxi home -- but made a detour first to the Cyber Parc, this really lush green expanse of deeply shaded red-pebble pathways interspersed with huge-format photos from that enormous book, The Earth From Above. I neglected to take any photos of the photos in situ, but we did find the watery green oasis at the heart of the park. Next morning we went again to the Majorelle garden -- in the cool of morning is the best time to go, but even then the hordes had arrived and the sun was warm by the time we left.

Here is the crane whose ballast moved disquietingly above us as we passed beneath. Notice the hotel sign at right: "Guéliz" is the name of the French-built part of the city; Guéliz, I heard somewhere recently, is a bastardization of the French word for church, église -- because it was in this "new" part of town that the protestant church was built, circa 1912.


Looking back along Mohammed V -- a lone pedestrian waiting for his chance to continue across, La Koutoubia in the far smogged distance:


She's becoming a proficient shot. Hazel's thousandth self-portrait:


I'd have to look at a map to tell you where this was taken. Duh. A true tourist shot:


Olive trees bearing fruit we could have harvested had the bus broken down right there:


Cyber Parc green-tiled and fountain-splashing pools. There were four laid out in a grid. Hazel was taken in by the first and didn't budge.


Picture of splashed up-close cool:


Water, Dappled Light, Green Tile, Girl:


Ripples and right angles, concentration:


She is happy.



Next morning, back out into saturated color:


If I had the energy, I think Hazel would be happiest if we left the house each day at 8 and didn't get home till bath time. She loves to go "out and about" -- how she puts it with that particular emphasis and cadence all her own.


This post is turning into a Hazel-on-location shoot.


The view of the lily pond at the end of the tiled walkway pictured above:


Here is a cool corner perpetually in shadow (I love the polished concrete walkways throughout -- the reflected light magnifies and intensifies the abundant color). The building at left with the plaster-carved frieze-work is the graceful blue backside of the Islamic Collection at the Jardin Majorelle. A guide we talked with said the collection is to reopen in January, magnificent things to be on display.


We're about to drink thé à la menthe, the famed whiskey marrocain, its effects a tad closer to those of real whiskey now that I've realized a type of green tea, caffeinated green tea, is its key ingredient. Here I was blithely believing I was feeding Hazel a benign sweet herbal treat. Hmmm. She was happy to have her own menu, to wrap her fingers up in its pleasing elastic.


No one wonder she looks so jazzed. I need to revisit the management of her tea-love.


Plus windfall cookie! (Baby-doll slumps in the lap; I will never get used to the weirdness of the eye-blinking doll.)


Shoes off. Cool tile. We could have stayed all day.

1 comment:

  1. Your "true tourist shot" is really funny. It does happen to all of the tourists that they take so many pictures that half of them show nothing and half they don´t know where it was taken. When I travelled to Argentina, the only good pictures I took were from the balcony of the apartment in buenos aires I was staying in. The rest are no good, it is important to keep the images in your head, that is what counts!
    Nikki

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