Casablanca 1/2 Marathon

Jamil bought me the movie, Casablanca, for valentine's day this past year soon after we found out that we were moving to Morocco.  After almost 6 months in country, we finally made it to the famous city for the Casablanca Marathon.  It's less than an hour from Rabat, but after reading about the various cities in Morocco, it made it's way to the bottom of our travel list.  From a tourist's perspective, you're better off just watching the movie.  I'm going to give it another chance when we have time to visit the Hassan II Mosque.  I have no doubt that it will be amazing!

These musicians can be found all over Morocco.  They play drums and cymbals as they dance around and shake their tassels.  Don't be surprised if they throw their hat on you as you pass in an attempt to make a few dirhams.  These are just two of the pictures from our unexpected, full out photo shoot all while Gabriel was sleeping.

This was the view from our hotel window.  Seriously?  Why in the world would you need to have traffic lights at a 7 point intersection when you can clearly paint directions on the ground?  Holy Chaos!  We have never seen anything like the traffic in Casa... and we've seen a lot these past several months!  Let's just leave it at that.

The Olmsted team pre-race photo:  3 different countries (Jamil-Morocco, Megan [Olmsted wife]-France, Christina-Morocco, and Megan-Senegal) and 4 branches of service were represented in the 1/2 Marathon! 

Go Morocco!

 The boys were watching closely at the finish line for daddy's bright green shirt!

 Congratulations, Jamil!!!  We are so proud of you!

Everyone finished around the 2 hour mark, so we got the chance to congratulate the whole crew! Thanks to Megan for snapping many of these photos.  We felt like we already knew her after reading her awesome blog, but it was such a pleasure to finally meet in person.  Here's to many more adventures with our Olmsted family!