A very full day with three different painting sessions for the artists and plenty of sightseeing for the others. We were taken first to El Bahia where the non-painters spent an hour (with about one million of our closest friends) among the treasures of this old palace with all its mosaics and zellige (tiles).

The light from the coloured windows created an interesting affect.

Meanwhile, our artists were bussed by Majid to the Majorelle Gardens, previously the home of Yves St Laurent and Pierre Bergé. The private gardens are now open to the public and not surprisingly that’s where the majority of our group chose to capture some of the beauty of this oasis in the middle of Marrakech’s bustle.

After a visit to the Berber Museum – here are some of us lined up waiting to enter ….

[Note the cobalt blue which is a distinctive feature of the gardens and Yves St Laurent’s signature colour.]

… we lunched in Café Majorelle and had time for a critique of the morning’s painting session.

Next stop was Dar Si Saïd Museum where we had permission to paint in the gardens and explore more beautiful rooms.

Then finally, on to Jmaa el Fna – the iconic bustling hectic crazy town square of Marrakech full of people, stalls, snake charmers and food tents, where we spent a few hours both exploring La Place and painting from the terrace of Aqua Restaurant, where we also had dinner.

Back to our riad in the medina for a fond farewell to Majid, our wonderful guide and driver who is leaving us tonight (we will have a friend of his drive us to Casablanca on Saturday).