Back in Setif, I asked Ahmed (the friend of Taha) if he’d want to meet up for shisha and tea. We first went to the famous lakes in Setif (I guess they could be nice if there was less trash.. ), then we found a restaurant to have Zviti and a Shisha place with people. And even women 😉 And it was neither in a hotel nor in the mall! Some guys were having a birthday party there, and we got some cake, too! No. No other people, only us!
The next morning we met again, to go to Bejaia for 2 days. We had breakfast on the way, then stopped at the waterfall on the way, and arrived in Bejaia around noon. The plan was to stay in the flat of a friend in some kind of holiday resort. The guy responsible for renting her place (and others) out to people stayed at her flat and she wanted to get rid of him 🙂 Didn’t work. He offered us a ‘beautiful villa’ instead, for the same price, next to the sea and with 3 bedrooms. The original plan was to get it for a ‘symbolic price’ but the friend warned us that the villa might turn out more expensive. We ended up getting it for as cheap as the 1-star hotel on booking com an hour away 😉 But it was a mess and had definitely not been cleaned in a long time. We even had a dirty plate and some empty plastic bottles in the sink 😉 Whatever, it’s ok for a night.
And this was my chance to finally go swimming! Weather was great, 20 degrees or so, the beach was right there, and it was almost empty – so about nobody who could mind me and my underwear 😉 The water was quite cold.. but it was nice and warm back out in the sun. And I finally did it! 😀
We had fish in a restaurant next to the sea, then went up to the hills for the first viewpoint just before it got dark.
The next day we went to another viewpoint, a bit higher, stopping at the (surprisingly modern) museum where we were (not so surprisingly) the only visitors and got a personal tourguide.
Back down in the city, we walked around, had tea, walked through the market, and weren’t allowed to see the theater from inside (they’re building stuff and even being a foreigner didn’t allow me in), but we met a man in there who told us about his hitchhiking journey in europe, in the 80ies (?). If only we were still there for a few days, we could make a plan for a barbecue in the forest,.. Well, next time 😉 He usually works up in the mountain so I can definitely find him again 😉 Also he recommended us to try the chickpea sandwich from the icecream shop – that’s what the sign said, at least.