The Casablanca airport is a stark place, little changed from when I landed there 25 years ago. Patrolled by very sharp-looking military men, it has virtually no signs to help the traveler, and the ones that exist are confounding. We follow the "transit" sign, for example, and are stopped by soldiers and pointed back to the corridor we’ve been traveling in. Before we know it, we’re in the bleak waiting room, waiting for our plane, which doesn’t leave for an hour and a half. There’s no place to change money, no café, nothing but a pretty tiled room with an encased model of the city of Casablanca that looks oddly at contrast with the rest of the building, and the waiting room we’re in. There’s a soda machine, but it takes only dirhams, which we haven’t been able to procure yet. The three ladies outside the restroom are angling for money from people using the ladies’ room, but they can’t accept French change and shoo me in anyway.
The flight to Marrakesh is shorter and better, with breath-taking views of the stark North African terrain. We fly low enough to see it all--mountain communities surrounded by mud walls, animals grazing, a lone river but myriad wadis, the domed edifices that are the burial grounds of local religious leaders, the Marrakech Express trains speeding toward the city from Casablanca, and more of those mysterious circular fields.
Marrakesh is warm in both temperature and atmosphere. The passport control man smiles at the lime-green ink on my landing card, and another airport attendant goes through the line bringing elderly people to the front--a good thing because this is the longest passport control line in Africa, I expect. There are two men each in three booths, checking maybe 50 passengers, and it takes about a half hour to complete the job.
Once through, we find a nice gentleman holding a "Maison Arabe" sign awaiting us. He takes our bags and we go to change money from a silent guy at the exchange window. Then it’s into the jaunty little Maison Arabe van, out onto a broad boulevard, and into Marrakesh, which is just around the corner.