Morocco Writing Retreat And How to Help With Earthquake Relief

Morocco Writing Retreat And How to Help With Earthquake Relief

This summer I led a travel writing retreat based in Marrakesh, Morocco — the city where I lived for two years. Last week an earthquake took thousands of lives in the Atlas Mountains, one of the places we explored, and left thousands more Moroccans homeless. My heart breaks for families who are hurting there. Thankfully, my friends in the video below who live in Marrakesh and the Atlas Mountains are safe, but former students and friends I’ve talked with are still in shock.

I appreciate friends on social media who have showed concern and asked about ways to help. I’ve worked with Amal, Project SOAR, and Education for All, below. They’re run by people who will be sure your donations provide relief.

A great way to support Morocco is tourism. The country has taken hits from pandemic border closings, lockdowns, and the earthquake. Marrakesh is up and running. If you want the epic adventure of a lifetime, start planning a trip for 2024. Message me at cindylmccain1@gmail.com if I can help. Please see just a bit of what a stay in Marrakesh is like in the video below. If you book at Riad Mur Akush, our home base for the retreat, within the next 4 weeks, the riad is donating 20% to Amal Center for Earthquake Relief Fund. To help in this way, you must use THIS LINK.

And if you’d like to join a community of creative explorers like the incredible women who joined me last summer, reach out. Morocco has been inspiring artists for centuries. Contact me at cindylmccain1@gmail.com regarding writing workshops online, in Morocco, and beyond.

Cindy McCain Writing Retreat
Artist dates inspired our writing with beauty, rest, and adventure. One of them was spent at Jnane Tamsna where we enjoyed lunch, played in multiple pools, and rode camels.
Morocco Writing Retreat in Marrakesh and Essaouira

Morocco Writing Retreat in Marrakesh and Essaouira

Your heart knows the way. Run in that Direction.–Rumi

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Write what should not be forgotten.–Isabel Allende

Travel to have more to remember.–Cindy McCain

Do you need time away to jumpstart or finish a writing project? Do you have travel tales you need to tell?

Did you vow in 2020 pandemic lockdown that you would make travel a priority? Do you need to feel alive on new adventures…  meet kindred spirits… fulfill new or old dreams? 

Whether you’re a novice writer or pro honing your craft, on this retreat you’ll journal your journey with proven tools, inspiration, and a creative, supportive community in an exotic land. You’ll tell your best story and leave with the ultimate souvenir (remembrance). Your personal essay or memoir chapter will transport others and you back to Morocco (or whatever place you need to write about and never forget). 

Though I’ve journeyed across 27 countries, nowhere like magical Morocco has provided me as much rest, adventure, creative energy, and beauty. While living there, I fell in love with diverse landscapes, rich cultural experiences, and wonderful people. For me, the time was a life reset. If you follow this blog, you know that I returned to Marrakesh during the summer of 2018 and began planning this retreat. The pandemic placed it on hold, but in 2023 it finally happened! See the video here and stay tuned for the next one!

Is this what your soul might needs?

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Imagine yourself with a journal or laptop perched on the ramparts of the Atlantic coastal town, Essaouira, formerly known as the Port of Timbuktu. Anything’s possible here, where goats (not pigs) fly.

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Imagine wide, open spaces to breathe … like the mountain terrace of a Berber village overlooking Toubkal, highest peak of the Atlas Mountains and northern Africa.

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Here Martin Scorsese filmed Seven Years in Tibet starring Brad Pitt.

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Free your inner child (creative unconscious) to play in pools and secret gardens on a week-long artist date. 

We’ll have lunch, then scatter to write or relax in multiple secluded pools and gardens at Jnane Tamsna (followed by a camel ride).

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Authentic meals with new friends and rooftop views of the Marrakesh Medina, UNESCO World Heritage Site founded in the 11th Century.

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Riad Mur Akush

 

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Dinner in a former Pasha’s Palace.

Photo walks. Cooking classes. Discovering ways to volunteer/support Project Soar, Center for Abandoned & Disabled Children, The Amal Center, and Jarjeer Mules.

Journaling to the sound of courtyard fountains and on outdoor terraces of a private riad.  Reading your work at a literary salon by the sea.  

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Truly, Morocco has been a creative hub for generations of artists, each meeting his or her respective Muse there. Edith Wharton, Tennessee Williams, Paul Bowles… Josephine BakerJimi Hendrix, Cat Stevens … Orson Welles, Alfred Hitchcock, George Lucas.  Here Laurence of ArabiaIndiana JonesGladiator, and Game of Thrones came to life. Teaching, writing, and wandering there, my life felt epic, too.  

Join me in Morocco for some of my favorite local experiences from the Atlas Mountains to Marrakesh to the African coast. Choose what your soul needs.

Package Includes:

  • 4 Workshop Sessions: Craft Study & Workshop with Feedback
  • Inspiration & Free Time for Writing
  • Copy Edit by Instructor
  • Literary Salon Reading by the Sea
  • 7 nights Accommodations in private rooms w/ baths (5 in Marrakech medina riad and 2 in Essaouira with sea view
  • Airport Transfers
  • Private Transportation to Essaouira, High Atlas Mountains, and Palmeraie  
  • Mule trek and lunch in a Berber village
  • Luxury Resort for Lunch, Botanical Gardens, Pools, and a Camel Ride
  • Medina Guided Tour, Bargaining Assistance, Photo Walk, and Entrance to Bahia Palace and Ben Youssef
  • 7 Breakfasts, 2 Lunches, 2 Dinners
  • Tips
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  • *Does Not Include: 
  • Flights
  • Travel Insurance (required)
  • 3 Group Meals (order from menu): Rooftop Lunch in Medina, Dinners in a Former Pasha’s Palace and on a Rooftop by the Sea
  • Alcohol
  • Free time options and transfers (Suggestions: Amal Cooking Class, Lunch at Museum of Confluence, Hammam/Spa Day, Jardin Marjorelle, Lunch at other locations with gorgeous pools and gardens, volunteering if possible) 

Deposit Due to Reserve a Space

Contact cindylmccain1@gmail.com for all details.

*FEEL FREE TO SHARE RETREAT BROCHURE BELOW.

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