September 27, 2017
Today was a looooong drive from Fes to the Sahara just outside of the city of Merzouga. A friend of a friend runs the Sahara Garden. Brahim coordinated everything for us and welcomed us upon our arrival with open arms. Truly an amazing human being. We were welcomed with dinner and singing and dancing around a bonfire.
September 24, 2017
Our second stop in Morocco was the blue city of Chefchaoen. A small city located up on a hill, wandering thru the medina surrounded by so many shades of blue was quite a different experience from Tangier. We stayed at Casa Perleta, a small bed and breakfast recommended by our friend. It was perfectly located within the upper hill area of the medina. The blue hues of the walls of Chefchaoen are believed to have originated when the Jews came while escaping Hilter in the 1930s. The blue is said to serve as a reminder to lead a spiritual life while symbolizing the sky and heaven.
September 11 - 15, 2017
Enroute to our close friends' wedding in Greece we found a cheap flight to Paris via Reykjavik, Iceland and decided to take advantage and do a little stopover in an effort to (fingers crossed) see the northern lights. We decided to restrict our few days to just the southern highlights along the coast. The first thing we noticed was that even though it was supposedly shoulder/low season in Iceland there were significantly more people than when we came the year before in August.
Badlands was badass. The plains literally just end and the Badlands begin, no soft transition, it just drops off into what you see below. It's always cool to see the layers in rock when erosion has done its dirty work over thousands of years. Really cool place to visit and just take in how long something like this must have taken to create.
Tomorrow we begin the long drive home to California. The first trip is coming to an end.
- Jonathan
Also known as the presidents who make up Mt. Rushmore. We got to Mt. Rushmore at about 6am to catch the best sun light for photos. As hard as it was for me to get up early, it ended up being worth it and we had the whole place to ourselves! We even spotted a mama and baby mountain goat coming down the mountain.
- Allie
