Port Yasmine, Hammamet, Tunisia.

Position:  36:22:22N     10:33:23.5E

5^th September, 2013

We arrived at Port Yasmine around at 7.30am. Port Yasmine is a purpose built tourist development near Hammamet the main centre of the area. We tied up alongside the fuel dock as directed by the pilot book. The various government offices were all near the marina offices and they started to open up at 8.00am
John then started the one-hour process of checking in. 
The Police were first. There was a lot of paperwork, lots of stamping of documents, lots of joking and smiling and then, for the first time ever for us ..a visit to the boat.

“Do you have a gift for the local police?”

Asked the police official as they walked over to the boat.
Half expecting something like this but still a little stunned, John replied,

“Err. What sort of gift? Wine?”

“Oh anything you might like to give. Euros?”
John produced a 20 Euro note. The official huffed. John produced another 20 Euro note.

“Oh, Too much! You are too kind!!”
 As the official promptly pocketed the notes.

The search of the boat was efficient and fast. John introduced the rest of the crew amongst smiles and chatter. The police official then took John to the customs office whilst chatting away all the time and offering any help that might provide to make our stay really enjoyable.
At the customs Office there was more stamping and filling of forms and another trip to the boat. They were most interest in tallying up the electronic items such as Computers, iPads, GPS, radios and TVs.

We were now officially in Tunisia.
We were now allowed to check in at the marina office.

This just goes to show that in the event I was clearly happy to provide officials with ‘backshish’ – to ease the flow of the process of every life as well as everyone else.

We did have a good spot in the marina.

Port Yasmine is specially built for tourists from Northern Europe it has a beach, beach bars, a marina complex with bars, Karaoke and a strip of hotels lining the beach road.

Every day, at 10am, 2 amazingly big good-looking pirate galleon reproductions would leave dock full off tourists. They have to be the best looking party boats I’ve ever seen. Always, even before they got out of the harbor the singing would begin, then the pirates would climb the rigging doing various acrobatic feats whilst other crew members would be leading their guests with buccaneer songs and chants.
Everyday, at 1.30pm they would return and the singing was always louder. Everyone was having a great time.  ..and why not!

We took a taxi to Hammamet for dinner. The restaurant had good ratings from trip advisor. We use TripAdvisor a lot these days. Hammamet is an important coastal town and it was a key part of the ‘Spring Uprising’. It has a real African feel to it. There are flashy beach houses on the shoreline.
Except one of the beach houses was a little burnt out and the worse for wear. That beach home had previously belonged to one of the hated dictator’s extended family and was pillaged and burnt within the first few hours!

We had an interesting ride as we came into Hammamet the town. There were all sorts of hanging meats, you know cow and pig heads and feet, the normal sort of stuff! Often there were barbecues outside their shops whilst the owners cooked up some tender morsel. I’m not sure how their cleanliness standards would fair in Toronto and their restaurant hygiene rating system.

We were dropped outside the restaurant in a very dark and secluded area near the centre of town. Taking a deep breath, we walked through a dark arch overgrown with plants jumping at every bump, squeak and hair falling to the ground.
A beautiful courtyard with tables, chairs and many trees twinkling with decoration lights appeared before us.  We enjoyed the excellent meal and arranged for a taxi to take us back from the restaurant.  It was not an area you would walk around shooting the breeze with the locals.

We decided to next go to Tunis and stay overnight.
But how on earth do we get there?

Louages!

In Tunisia they have formed collectives of minibuses. Each minibus is pretty old and dismal with 8 or 9 seats. These are called Louages. Louages go from one town to another on fixed routes. The drivers wait until they are full of passengers and just leave taking a fare along the route. Passengers just arrive at the central car park and look for a minibus that is going to where they want to go.
It’s so simple and efficient!

We were told to get a taxi to Hammamet and then catch the Louage from Hammamet to Tunis. 
The Louage system was very cheap (just 2 euros per person for the whole trip to Tunis) and very efficient. I would like to see London Transport or the TTC in Toronto being able to compete with them.
Our Louage was full in a few minutes and we found ourselves and another 5 of our closest new friends zooming along the freeway to the centre of Tunis.

Of course when you get to your destination you are expected to know where you are going next! We didn’t.
We did have a map that none of us could read! We did know the hotel was in the historic part of town, the medina. We have an address.

We ‘sort of’ circled around generally smiling and scratching our heads. We couldn’t get a taxi driver to give us a ride because they decided our destination was “just up the road”. But one of the drivers took pity on us and pointed in the general direction he thought we should walk in.
So we did as we were told.

This turned out to be one of the highlights of our trip. We wheeled our suitcases through market stalls selling fruit and vegetables, we trundled over toes and through puddles of ..something? We were jostled, bumped and waved at. We kept telling Cathy to put that expensive looking Canon camera with a cannon-sized lens system away.
I’m thinking we didn’t look like locals.
Eventually, we found ourselves at the edge of the Medina. Traffic was at a standstill. Either because we were standing in the middle of the junction or because there was so much traffic of donkey’s, horse and carts – even cars!
No wonder the taxi guys declined! 
Armed with our trusty map we entered the Medina.
What a joke!  We were lost within minutes! No lane signs matched the map. Tunisian people are really honest and friendly (well, unless they work on a market stall in the Medina that is) so people were trying to be helpful without success.

We chose not to stay at the Hilton, the Marriott, Four Seasons, oh no! We chose to stay at a tiny boutique hotel down a backstreet in the backstreets in the Medina of Lanes.  We were sent in lots of wrong directions. 

Finally we came across two of the kindest decent caring guys we have EVER met.

The older one helped us but said, “I can’t walk that far, but wait”, and called over to a young man with his mobile phone and explained our situation.

“The young man”, he said, “will take you”.

He was an off duty policeman. We set off with our latest friend, perhaps a little apprehensively, and found ourselves being led back in the Medina from whence we came. Through the Kasbah with it’s very small alleys and covered passages full of intense scents and colours. Up and down and around every bend you could imagine. Lots of stalls selling anything from clothes to fish & meat. 
The young man stopped at a stall.
He bought a large bottle of water and handed it to us!
About 20 minutes later still we were finally outside a very cute hotel with a gated entrance. Our hotel! We were kilometers away from where we had first met him!
We thanked him and tried to give him a tip. 
He resolutely refused!
Neither would allow us to pay for the water!
He quickly disappeared back into the Kasbah to anymore of our protestations.

Can you imagine that EVER happening in London or Toronto! What a guy. We didn’t even get to know his name.

We checked in and got NEW maps!
The hotel manager booked us “the best restaurant in all of Tunis!” for evening dinner and then we went sightseeing back into the Kasbah.
We were getting lost again. We were lost within 10 minutes.

A gentle looking man speaking very good English told us of an excellent place for tea and “the best ‘panoramic view’ in all of Tunis”.
Just a few minutes away.

We now know that whenever some tells you in a Kasbah that something is just a few minutes away – he’s lying! It’s not!

We followed him. After all the last person we followed was amazing!
We were being hurried along but still in the Kasbah.
This is when Cathy said to Les, “I read somewhere to be beware of panoramic views. There is NO panoramic view. It’s a ruse.”  Les stopped John & Bob in their tracks and quickly spilled the beans.
But we were now actually at a shop and at the little stair case to the side leading to who knows where..

We declined entering the stairway. They insisted! We declined again. They insisted a little more determinedly. They were trying to hustle us into the shop.  We said an absolutely NO! ..and started walking in the other direction. Our gentle man friend with the good English was now getting agitated, even angry.

He finally gave in, threw is hands up the air and left us to find or own way out of the maze shouting something instructive to us.
Now we had to find our way back towards the Hotel.
We wanted no more help! 
We finally came out of the Medina into a large square at the end of a large tree lined avenue with expensive shops
We had arrived at the famous ‘Sea Gate’ and the more modern city of Tunis. The avenue was the busy Avenue Habib Bourguiba (often referred to in travel guides as the Champs–Elysees of Tunis). Here the large impressive colonial buildings provide a clear contrast to smaller older districts.

We were then surprised to see wire around many of the government buildings and guarded by soldiers with machine guns. We couldn’t even get into the famous Cathedral of St Vincent de Paul. Because of the demonstrations that had preceded us the previous few days the government were clearly taking no chances with discontent getting out of control again.

We stopped for a coffee and watched several of the street vendors being moved on by local police, Batons at the ready. We a café with a good balance of both men and women. We noticed many of the cafes we passed were clearly men only.

Under the previous dictatorship the traditional clothing such as the hijab, (the head scarf), amongst a few other items, were banned. This was part of the regime’s drive to make Tunisia a little more western. Under the new government there is complete freedom of clothing. This allows anyone to wear whatever they wish. As a result there have been many women glad to get back to wearing of the traditional headscarf. I have to say, many younger women. There were far more women wearing a headscarf by choice then here than in Istanbul, for example.

Walking back to the hotel John mentioned he was ‘not feeling too good’.

That evening we went our top Tunis restaurant. This was just a short walk from our hotel. How strange? We arrived at the right address. We were next to several of the ministerial offices and government departments.
Well, it looked like the right address.
There were huge and substantial yellow ornate double doors barring our way. There was a tiny brass plaque subtly displaying restaurant name.
We knocked on the door.
It was slowly opened.
We enquired if we had the right place?
“Please enter Sir, Madam. Welcome”

We entered a huge vestibule with tiles, dark carved wooden accent items and chandeliers. We were then taken to an anteroom.
The Maître d looked Bob UP and then DOWN.

Bob only had shorts and he was therefore showing his knees – not cool.
He was asked to wear white kaftan over his clothes – we were all jealous!
..and it suited him in distinguished way.

We were then led to the opulent dining room. The meal was equally as good.

As always it seems, in a muslim country, the wine is heavily taxed.
This was a true Tunisian experience.

Oh dear.
The next day John clearly had ‘Tunis Tummy’.
He was not fit enough to sightsee and so we left Bob & Cathy. Instead we made a dash via our Louages back to the boat. We found a taxi who drove us straight to the Louage station. Again we only waited a few minutes before we were loaded and on our way. We were back on the boat in 90 minutes to John’s relief.

The next day we had to provision for our 9-day trip to Gibraltar.
This was not so easy as Port Yasmine had just one ‘supermarket’ and they only had a delivery once a week – a few days ago.
 With John stuck on the boat and still not feeling too good, Bob Cathy & Les went into Hammamet to get provisions.  At the local market, the flies and smell made that a quick visit.  The Hammamet local supermarket had some provisions such as little vegetables, but no meat.
We were told to go along the street. We walked a fair distance when we saw a special shop for ‘chicken’.  Thank goodness it was modern and had clean white tiles. Bob went on to look for the ‘other meat’ shop.  He came back and reported that the meat was being nicely marinaded with the flies.
We bought lots of chicken!
A great experience but not so good for provisioning! 

We leave for Gibraltar tomorrow.
Bob is complaining of ‘Tunis Tummy’.