Paris to Fes, long way in a short time...

Hello!

So have travelled rather a long way since my last post... this might be somewhat scrambled as the letters are all in the wrong place....

Anyway, we made it to Paris before 9am on Saturday, the eurostar was fun but ruined slightly by an annoying woman who managed to talk nonstop all the way there to some poor bloke about very boring stuff.  Nevermind.  Main missions in Paris were to buy an aweso,e picnic for the train to Madrid which we did from a market in the latin quarter, drank coffee, ate croissants, had a long lunch and did some more wandering.  We decided to go and check out the Moulin Rouge which was very tacky and not that spectacular but good to see, then we bought some cheap red wine and a copy of french vogue and got on the train to Madrid.  The overnight train was great, it always feels like an adventure to me.  We were in a car with a spnish lady and a french lady so we mudled through a conversation in a mixture of languges, went for a visit to the bar car (for novelty value), ate our picnic then slept until Madrid.  We had a pretty easy change in Madrid complicated only by part of the metro being closed meaning we had to get off and get on a bus for part of the way, but there was still time for coffee and giant nepolitana di chocolate, mmmm. 

The bus trip was long!  Think I read almost an entire book... We got a nice tour of lots of Spanish seaside resorts I`ve never been to;  Malaga, Marbella etc, then finally Algeciras and the port.  By this time it was 8.15pm and the next ferry to Tangier was at 10pm so we decided to head to Cueta, a Spanish enclave along the coast from Tangier, shorter crossing qand less hassles once we arrived.  So that was all very easy...  found somewhere to stay with no problem then went out to explore for a bit.

In the morning it was time to cross the border into Morocco.  We caught the bus to the edge of town then walked across the border which seemed to have a complete lack of signs and lots of big barbed wire fences...  There was just a portacabin where they stamped your passport, then a gate to walk through, then nothing except taxis....  So we got in one and made our way to Tangier for some horrendously overinflated price, grrrrr (not nice people).

We decided to leave Tangier straight away and go to Fez so we bought bus tickets from some very frienly young men who took us to the bus, put our luggage on and waved us goodbye.  Morocco is a very big country!  We passed through Tetouan and Chefchoaen and lots of other places, had a stop for mint tea and eventually arrived in Fes where we were escorted to the youth hostel by a nice man who just seemed to want to make sure we got there ok, he wrote down his name and phone number and told us where his family lived in case we needed anything because it is difficult during ramadan he said. 

The youth hostel in Fes is lovely, I highly recomend it, it's peaceful and cleqn and has the best cold showers ever.  We went more or less straight out to find food to eat and something for breakfast the next day as it was the first day or ramadan...  The next day we got a guide to show us around the medina, who unfortunately took us to shops then helpfully disappeared while we tried to leave without buying anything...  We tried a few bits of street food but unfortunately my body decided it was going to vomit after I ate or drank, booo.  Anyway, feeling much better now, we are in Marrakech and I'm tired so I'll write some more tomorrow.  I like Marrakech.  Good night.