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Spotlight on Morocco: Eight activities not to miss
I recently returned from Morocco, where centuries of African and European influences have transformed ancient civilizations into one of the world’s most unique and diverse regions. From modern metropolises to the Sahara Desert, Morocco provides an opportunity to explore distinctly different settings while absorbing lessons of the past and glimpses to the future.
With our local team there, I had the pleasure of traveling around Morocco to several cities and desert towns, and I was reminded how truly magical this country is. Morocco sometimes can be an overlooked destination, but it offers so many one-of-a-kind opportunities to explore cities, the mountains and the desert. For starters, it’s easy to get to from the United States; in fact, it is no longer than flying to many European destinations — and you get to spend time in an important and exotic country in Africa!
I encourage everyone to visit, and our team there specializes in creating amazing programs for every group eager to explore Morocco. As you’re planning your trip there, here are my favorite activities to do while visiting Morocco:
Visit the Medina of Fez
The medina (the old quarter) dates back to the end of the 8th century and nothing much seems to have changed since then. It is a maze of alleyways going up, down, left and right. It is pure pandemonium! Everywhere you look is a feast for the eyes: food markets, souvenir shops, carpet shops (that all offer the best prices), the oldest university in the world (University of al-Qarawiyyin), a wonderful madrasa and more. Plus, be sure to spend time at the iconic Chaouwara tanneries (right), where you can watch workers producing world-class leather using processes from medieval times. You can observe the work from a terrace at one of the leather shops; the view of the pits with the colored dye is mesmerizing.
Spend a few hours in the medina and make sure you have a guide with you. Also, while you are in Fez, make sure you explore the lovely new section (Ville Nouvelle). The main Parisian-style boulevard is a wonderful place to watch families spending time together.
Spend a day in the Sahara Desert
It is about a nine-hour drive (through the Middle Atlas Mountains) from Fez to the Sahara Desert. Once you arrive, the towns of Rissani and Erfoud are good bases to explore the desert. For your day in the desert, start off with a visit to the local market and kasbah in Rissani. Then in a 4x4 vehicle, drive into the desert to meet with a local Berber family and learn about their way of life in the desert. They, of course, will make you some delicious mint tea. After driving around the dunes and discovering fossils, you will stop for lunch and some rest. The icing on the cake is a camel ride to the top of the dunes to watch the sunset (top photo). It’s like nothing you’ve ever seen and could be one of your best travel experiences ever!
Sample local food
Sampling local cuisine always is a real treat, and Morocco is no exception. Most of the food you will eat will be fresh and locally grown. The most famous meal is a tajine, which is a stew cooked in earthenware pots. Tajines can be made with vegetables, chicken, lamb or beef. My favorite is beef with prunes and almonds. Also not to be missed is a delicious couscous, which is typically served on a Friday when many locals have the day or the afternoon off. A couscous can be made with vegetables, lamb, beef or fish. Whether you order a tajine or couscous, you also can have a “mezze” course, which is bread and about five small dishes with cooked vegetables. Dessert usually is mint tea and cookies.
Visit Jemaa el-Fnaa in Marrakesh
This is the main square and marketplace in the medina of Marrakesh and was designated a “Masterpiece of World Heritage” by UNESCO. This is where you see snake charmers, henna artists, fortune tellers, musicians, water sellers and more. It is like a setting from medieval times and is busy day and night, so make sure to spend a few hours here. I also suggest you sit down with some mint tea and just watch the people. Nearby, make sure you visit the 100,000 Spices shop, which purportedly offers a cure for most ailments and it is run by a wonderful local businessman.
And more …
My recent visit to Morocco was so amazing, so here are four more highlights that shouldn’t be missed:
• Spend an afternoon at the Roman ruins at Volubilis (above) and the nearby hilltop town of Moulay Idris, one of the most important Muslim pilgrimage places in the country!
• On the wonderful drive from Erfoud to Ouarzazate, stop at the spectacular Todra Gorge just outside the charming town of Tinghir. Then continue through the Dades Valley dotted with oases, palm groves and mud brick houses.
• Spend some time every day sipping sweet mint tea, the “Berber Whiskey.” It is a wonderful sociable experience. You will see people drinking it all over the place!
• Wherever you are in Morocco, explore the cities and towns by night as well as by day. The atmosphere is incredible. The locals are “night owls” — grown-ups and children alike.
Morocco is a magical place to visit, explore and study. Check out more of my photos on our Facebook page. I would love to share its treasures with you and your group. Please This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call me, and I would be happy to put together a fabulous itinerary for your next travel adventure.
Shukran,
Steve Hart Hart Travel Partners
Carrying on Father Tom's legacy
My good friend Father Tom Schaefer passed away a few days ago. He was Associate Vice President of Academic Affairs at La Roche University in Pittsburgh. He also was parish priest at both St. John the Baptist and St. John Chrysostom in Pittsburgh.
A true champion of study abroad, Tom loved everything international, but he held a special place in his heart for France and Africa. I had the privilege of spending time with him in Paris, and his cultural knowledge of France and his fluency in French astounded me. On one occasion, we were leading a group of educators around Sorbonne University with the local custodian who spoke no English. Tom simultaneously translated what he said perfectly with no prior preparation. It was beautiful.
I hope that you are doing well and looking forward to travel prospects in the near future. That light at the end of the tunnel is shining a bit brighter!
I wanted to share with you some exciting things that have been keeping us busy over the past few months.
It seems that we have turned a corner and are heading in the right direction. There is light ahead of the long tunnel. Sometimes, it seems like it is just a flicker, but I feel positive that with the rollout of the vaccines worldwide, we will be traveling soon. We just need to wait a bit longer.
As we celebrate Thanksgiving and reflect on the incredible challenges that we have faced in this unprecedented year, we feel blessed and grateful. We are so thankful to work with amazing educators and travel professionals like you, who have proven to be wonderful and supportive partners.
Our thoughts are with you and all of our travelers and friends during this challenging and unprecedented time, as the COVID-19 pandemic spreads.
The safety and security of our travelers always has been our top priority, and we worked diligently to ensure the safe return of our traveling groups earlier this month. We are in close contact with our partners, friends and colleagues around the world, who also are confronting this outbreak.
'So grateful': Read what our travelers have to say
By far, the most rewarding part of my job at Hart Travel Partners is reading comments from faculty and students about our trips after the groups return from their faculty-led programs around the world.
Our faculty leaders consistently rave about their experiences, including the ease of our planning, our customized itineraries, the connections to their curriculum and especially our world-class travel directors. Students and faculty alike also appreciate the way our unique programs inspire their desire to learn and travel more.
Here is a sampling of what some of our recent travelers said about our programs the past few months:
Cultural immersion: Colorful sights and sounds of English football
Sitting in the second row of the stadium, my father and I were surrounded by 2,000 passionate football fans, engrossed in a nil-nil match and exposed to a colorful array of East London language.
It was Torquay United F.C. vs. Dagenham & Redbridge F.C. in the Dagenham district of East London. On my recent trip to London over New Year’s, I accompanied my dad to the match to watch Torquay, a lower-level club he’s supported since he was a young boy.
Now, this is not Liverpool, Manchester United or my beloved Arsenal; this is not the Premier League. This is not even the second or third level of English football. This is the fifth tier of the pyramid—known as the National League. I spent my formative years in London, my parents still live there and I visit London a few times a year, but I had never experienced a fifth-tier football match before.
It’s the sort of cultural immersion experience you don’t get by visiting only the usual tourist spots or by driving by in a sightseeing bus. It’s the sort of experience you have to see—and hear—to appreciate.
Subject spotlight: Understanding business on a global scale
As the world becomes more interconnected and the global economy grows, understanding business and cultures around the world becomes more and more important.
That’s why we have seen more of our faculty-led groups interested in business-themed programs in destinations around the world.
We have helped groups arrange tours, meetings and presentations at companies (both small and large) in destinations throughout Europe, Asia and the Americas. Some of our groups have visited Volkswagen offices in Shanghai, explored a family-run pasta factory in Italy (below), met a private restaurant owner in Havana, and even met with executives from the Serie B soccer league in Italy as part of a sports management program.
Subject spotlight: Infusing art into any travel program
Art abounds all around us, especially when we travel.
The most popular destination cities, of course, include the world’s most important and famous museums. Hart Travel Partners groups regularly explore the Louvre and Orsay in Paris, the Uffizi and Accademia in Florence, the Tate Modern and National Gallery in London, the Rijksmuseum and Van Gogh in Amsterdam, a trio of splendid galleries in Madrid and a host of others.
But our groups do more than just visit these museums. Our faculty and students conduct lessons, attend seminars, participate in workshops and more. While we also regularly create specific art-focused travel programs, many of our groups will incorporate art museums on their trips, regardless of their curriculum or destinations.
Subject spotlight: Bringing history to life — even on the open seas
A fleet of Carthaginian ships, sailing to relieve a Roman blockade of the western coast of Sicily, halts near the Holy Island — the westernmost of the Aegadian Islands, now known as Marettimo.
Meanwhile, a fleet of Roman ships, spying Carthage’s movements, abandon their posts in the harbors of Drepana and Lilybaeum and anchor off the island of Aegusa — modern-day Favignana.
At daybreak, the Carthaginian navy sets sail for Sicily, only to be surprised and intercepted by a fleet of mast-less Roman ships. The leaner, more mobile Roman fleet rams the enemy ships, delivering a decisive defeat to the once superior Carthaginian navy.
The Battle of the Aegates in 241 B.C. was a major victory for the Roman Republic and effectively ended the First Punic War — more than 2,200 years ago.
It’s the sort of battle relegated to the history books, studied by naval historians and examined by professors and students for two millennia.
For a group of Hart Travel Partners students, though, it was a battle to be experienced — on the open seas.
Our faculty leaders rave not only about their experiences on a Hart Travel Partners program but also about our personalized service and how easy it is to lead a trip with us.
“In 15 years of doing student trips, this is one of the best trips I’ve ever had with students,” one faculty leader said after a recent HTP program. “Hart handled everything from A-Z. You can’t ask for better service.”
Even faculty leaders who’ve never before traveled abroad with students are amazed how easy it really is to travel with us.
Spotlight on Northern Italy: From villas to violins
I recently returned to the States from a rewarding research trip to Northern Italy with a local friend. What a lovely place!
Lake Como was the starting point for our trip, and it was simply spectacular. The lake reflects the surrounding Alps and stunning villas. Some villas are small and some are so huge that they’re more like palaces. Some of them look like they are unoccupied (with shutters drawn and no visible signs of life), but they all are impeccably maintained. And they all ooze hundreds of years of history, stories and aristocracy. It is a wonder to see them and imagine the centuries of history they have seen.
It’s been an amazing and busy year so far for Hart Travel Partners and our groups.
We've created wonderful travel programs around the world — from China to Europe, from Costa Rica to northern Africa. Along the way, our groups have enjoyed many unique educational — and exciting — experiences:
Our guarantee: Most direct flights within your budget
When you’re traveling, you want to get where you’re going as quickly and as easily as possible.
Especially on a faculty-led travel program, often with tight schedule constraints, you want to maximize your time exploring your destinations and actively engaging with your academic purpose. You don’t want to spend unnecessary time with extra flights just to get there — and back.
That’s why we always find the most direct flights within your budget.
When I was growing up in England and Spain, Belfast was not a city people traveled to unless they had to. The “Troubles” — with innocent lives lost amid the passionate tensions between the different factions of the Nationalists (Irish and Catholic) and the Loyalists (British and Protestant) — made the Northern Ireland capital a dangerous place to visit.
On my recent visit to Belfast, though, I was happy to see that — although the memories of recent events still are very much alive — the city is doing a fabulous job of “moving on.” And Belfast is booming! New hotels are popping up all over the place to meet a huge increase in demand for travelers. I can see why more and more travelers are flocking there with so much to see and do.
I believe where and what you eat when you’re traveling is important.
Especially on a faculty-led travel program, you want to immerse yourself completely in the local culture, and that definitely includes the local food. It’s important to be able to eat like a local and enjoy food that is typical to your destination. After an active day of learning, it’s important not only to enjoy a nourishing and satisfying meal but also to sample delicious dishes from your destination — whether it’s tapas in Spain, a curry in England or Peking duck in China.
That’s why we always serve meals with local fare that meet your budget.
Our guarantee: Central hotels that meet your budget
I believe where you stay when you’re traveling is important.
Especially on a faculty-led travel program, it matters that your hotel is in a good location so you can maximize your time, immerse yourself in the culture and get the most out of your travels. It matters that your hotel is comfortable and provides a good night’s rest after an active day of learning. And it matters that you are able to stay connected online.
That’s why as founder of Hart Travel Partners, I guarantee that we always find centrally located hotels that meet your budget. Plus, I guarantee that all of our hotels offer free WiFi.
The medina (the old quarter) dates back to the end of the 8th century and nothing much seems to have changed since then. It is a maze of alleyways going up, down, left and right. It is pure pandemonium! Everywhere you look is a feast for the eyes: food markets, souvenir shops, carpet shops (that all offer the best prices), the oldest university in the world (University of al-Qarawiyyin), a wonderful madrasa and more. Plus, be sure to spend time at the iconic Chaouwara tanneries (right), where you can watch workers producing world-class leather using processes from medieval times. You can observe the work from a terrace at one of the leather shops; the view of the pits with the colored dye is mesmerizing.
Sampling local cuisine always is a real treat, and Morocco is no exception. Most of the food you will eat will be fresh and locally grown. The most famous meal is a tajine, which is a stew cooked in earthenware pots. Tajines can be made with vegetables, chicken, lamb or beef. My favorite is beef with prunes and almonds. Also not to be missed is a delicious couscous, which is typically served on a Friday when many locals have the day or the afternoon off. A couscous can be made with vegetables, lamb, beef or fish. Whether you order a tajine or couscous, you also can have a “mezze” course, which is bread and about five small dishes with cooked vegetables. Dessert usually is mint tea and cookies.
My recent visit to Morocco was so amazing, so here are four more highlights that shouldn’t be missed: