Sidi Ifni

2/9/2026

Town Hall, Sidi Ifni

One of the things I love about going to new places is the assault to my senses, which can get a bit lazy, even in a place like Aix. It's a luxury that reminds me how big and beautifully varied the world is. That those experiences are stored in me, coming back around for a visit when I'm washing a dish or scratching my leg is a gift like no other. Sensory images visit unbidden but welcome; the sometimes melodic, sometimes too loud Call to Prayer, pungent ras-al-hanout at the market, the smell of tagines cooking mid-morning in the neighborhood where there was no one on the street, small, dark people bending over in the rocks looking for sea urchins, melodic Arabic perfectly matching the calligraphy, passed back and forth between sun-grizzled men in well-worn djellabas and shower shoes. Just for a second I am there.

I can too read Arabic. This says STOP.

It was Sidi Ifni because Joyce used to live there and needed to show me that not all Morocco is like Marrakesh. After flying into Agadir, it was a fascinating three-hour drive south on the last day of. school vacation, where families parked their cars in the middle of a scrappy field, put up sheets to block the wind, built fires and cooked their tagines while the kids played ball (sometimes the moms played too in their long robes). Challenging my expectations of a Moroccan desert, it was misty and green, a meteorological aberration, the result of this lousy cloud that's been over the whole Mediterranean for the last month or two. As we continued south, there was the bluey grey Atlantic with big waves on the right and bright green hills on the left, often with stony walls and sheep, reminding me of what I imagine Ireland to be, and sometimes when going through red cliffs reminiscent of the Isle of Wight. It was all very confusing because there were palm trees and there were Berbers with their heads covered up.

This was the sea vibe

And this, near my favorite cafe

Sidi Ifni is a town that is in what was once part of the Spanish part of Morocco, and it has a feeling of having been forgotten, or left in about 1930. There are grand buildings and for the most part, they're a little run down, but still beautiful. The town is made up of apparently many surfers later in the season, currently families of Moroccan and Berber heritage, a few European transplants and a posse of Northern Europeans living out their winters in their RVs on the beach. The rousing boule games and groups at cafes indicated a strong community. But really it's a local town and we were very much in the minority, unlike so many places that this old lady perceives as being taken over by annoying tourists like me.

The old Governor's House

Most of the residents are Muslim or Berber, but at one time, there was a big Christian presence, and this was the church

Apparently Franco's likeness once graced this pedestal

Sidi Ifni is very blue and white

As you know if you're a woman and have travelled in Muslim countries, it's not always comfortable. I brought long sleeved shirts and pants, but stupidly tighter shirts and well, sometimes it was too hot for a long sleeved shirt. But what is one to do? I am always of the mind of being one friendly human greeting another, but that doesn't always work, though most of the time it did. And things like going to get a coffee can be rife with uncertainty: "Hmmm, it's all men in djellabas with tea. If I sit down am I acknowledging that we're all just people having a beverage, or is there some societal nono I''m committing?" In the end, there was no reason for concern, everyone was accepting and for the most part, people were warm and welcoming.

We had an airbnb that had an ensuite for each of us, a courtyard in the middle and plenty of roof action that included couches for lying under a pergola with views over rooftops and to the ocean. Through circumstances too complicated to explain, a woman named Aziza cooked for us, motivating me to go to Marseille tomorrow to buy a tagine. While she never learned how to read and actually didn't know hot to cook early on, she taught herself on Youtube, serving us tagines, salads, dips, home made bread, home made yogurt and jams, fish.

The lovely and talented Aziza

Aziza's tagine. Leeks, tomatoes, haricot vert, fava beans, turnip, potato, prune, walnut and lemon.

Fish delish

Three of us travelled there together, which worked out well. I had known Valerie since last year when I was here, though we had only ever had a couple of meals together. She has lived in many different parts of the world, and as someone who was able to retire early and has a daughter in college, she has been taking advantage of her status, zipping here and there. Joyce, as mentioned, lived in Sidi Ifni, and likes to return once a year to see her friends and visit a place she loves. I was a bit of a hanger on, doing my own thing and wandering extensively, along the beach, into neighborhoods, across fields, up and down hills, in cafes and many "stores".

There were plenty of reminders of how much we as Americans have. As Patrick, a French man who picked me up a the airport said, "their clothes are your cast-offs". There is a big weekly market in a field that was once a landing strip, and there you see people putting out their tarps with conventional things like different kinds of food, household products or rugs, but there were also some with appliance parts, car parts, very used shoes and clothes, bottles. And yes, plenty of new Chinese crap.

But in general, it was a very special place to spend a few days, with kind and gentle people and a quiet and relaxing way of life.

We took two road trips, which I'll talk about next time.