I spent the last 2 weeks in Morocco at Deep Curl Surf Camp and just want to tell you a little bit about my trip..

First of all: I did this trip on my own. I always wanted to visit Morocco but not alone as a woman. Then I had the idea of going to a surfcamp so I won’t be all on my own. I wanted to try out surfing again anyway because it’s such a beautiful sport and because I wanted to challenge myself a little with trying to overcome my fear of waves.

When I started my trip I wouldn’t have thought it would be going to be this wonderful with having such a bad start! Bad start because at first I was at the wrong airport, had to take a really expensive taxi to get to the right one, just to find out that my flight was cancelled due to a strike! So I had to book a new flight 2 days later and also a new one flight home. This all cost me so much extra money but I’m happy anyway that I didn’t cancel my whole trip (I was close to doing that..). Luckily, a woman I got to know at the airport took me home with her and let me sleep at her place for free for 2 nights as she took the same new flight 2 days after together with me. So at least I didn’t have to spend any more money for accommodation. Lucky disaster.. 😉

My planned flight was to Agadir but my new flight was to Marrakech so that I had to take the bus from Marrakech to Agadir to get to the surfcamp which was 4 hours long and in the end I had to take 2 more taxis to get to a place where a guy from the surfcamp could pick me up to take me to the camp. It was all really chaotic.. fortunately 2 lovely Moroccan that I met on the bus helped me. Shows that you always meet people that help you even if you are alone, you just need to be open and not afraid to make contact with strangers.

When I arrived at the camp I was so exhausted but also so relieved.. as you can imagine! 😉 And I was just right for dinner. About the food: Before I booked my accommodation there I asked if it was possible to get vegan food and I was told that they don’t cook a lot with meat, dairy and eggs anyway so that this shouldn’t be a problem. And it was true. There were some things I didn’t eat like some meat or fish and cream cheese but we always had a big buffet in the morning and the evening and there were lots of vegan options for me. Not the stuff that I’d normally eat, like really oily dishes, but it was delicious anyway and as long as it’s vegan I don’t care as I’m not one of those people that are really strict when it comes to their diet. Especially when travelling I’m just happy for anything vegan. I think about 60% of what I ate there was bread, haha. We always took bread to the beach with us as well so I didn’t have to spend any money on food. So yes, I believe that it’s possible to eat vegan anywhere, there are always some options and if not: Just ask. Especially when you’re for example in a really fancy hotel, the people there will probably try to do anything possible to keep their guests satisfied.

We spent almost all day at the beach each day with surfing. As in France some years back, I took some surf lessons again and I really loved it. I also lost my fear of waves, as I hoped to. 🙂 I don’t even know anymore why I was always so scared and panicky in the past when it came to waves. Guess that also shows how much I grew as a person, I was just going into surfing completely this time and just doing it without thinking and worrying that much. Doesn’t mean I’m good at surfing now (I’m not, haha) but I’m so proud of myself anyway.

After surfing we almost every day went out to the village to get our usual avocado smoothie which was just too good, really need to try this at home! One the way there you could also sadly see lots of dead animals everywhere. It’s just so normal that the meat is just hanging everywhere for buying it, I was always pretty disgusted by this. But of course Morocco also has some amazing markets with delicious fruits, veggies and spices. I wish the dates here were as cheap as there. The prices in Morocco in general are, except for alcohol, really cheap. So at least I did not have to spend that much money there with all the extra money I already had to spend on this trip. 😉

One day I took a day off from the beach to join a trip to Paradise Valley which is a beautiful valley with natural water basins where you can also do cliff jumping. I’m a little disappointed to say that I didn’t do it – I sadly just couldn’t overcome my fear of heights. There were some crazy people though jumping from what were about 15-20m, I guess. It was fun to watch them all jumping though and to just spend some nice time with others hiking, swimming and just relaxing.

In the evening I was pretty much always really exhausted and went to bed quite early. Well, at least during the first days as my body was not used to all the surfing and every muscle in my body hurt. My skin also clearly wasn’t used to all the sun so that I got some bad sunburn. Two days I wasn’t really feeling well and had a bad fever one night with sweating heavily during sleeping. Luckily it went over quite quickly, probably because I also took lots of medication. I usually try to not take anything but of course, when you’re on a trip you try to do anything to get healthy as soon as possible again to enjoy your time. It probably was just a sunstroke. The temperature there actually wasn’t too high but of course the sun in Morocco is a lot stronger than here in Germany and with being in the water all day it’s even more likely to get a sunburn.

We also often just chilled on the terrace together in the evening and had some fun times with good conversations. That what I love about travelling alone and just going anywhere alone in general: You have to socialise with strangers to not stay alone and I absolutely love meeting new people!  So my life there was pretty much just surfing, chilling, eating, drinking, talking, enjoying nature,.. well, except for that one crazy night we all went out to party together, haha.

When it was time for me to leave I was really sad, it was pretty bad. I knew I had to go back to a life that I’m not satisfied with, with sitting in an office all day long.. and just going back to Germany in general frustrated me. I feel like the people here often are just so much colder, always complaining, always stressed, always so correct,.. I experienced the people in Morocco to be really warm, friendly, relaxed and honest. Maybe that’s just my impression but it’s not just Morocco with which I feel this difference to Germany. Even when I spent a semester studying in Sweden (which you’d think is pretty similar to Germany) I felt this difference in the people’s characters. And by the way, I didn’t make any bad experiences with men in this country. Of course, you get some weird looks here and there as a blonde woman with open hair but for me that was it, nothing else happened.

So all in all: I fell in love with this country, had an amazing trip, made great experiences and met wonderful people. I’m sure this will not remain to be my one and only visit.