What we have been up too in brief...

so...we left you in Azrou....
¤ we travelled to Marrakech wiv our friends nadia and gregg in there hippy van (matt had the shits, but took a bum blocker so survived the journey,

¤ on the way we camped on top of amazing waterfalls,

¤spent a night in Marrakech, claire was poorly and tired so not much happened,

¤took off to Essaouira on a nice bus because claire felt poorly,

¤spent three days in Essaouira, it was rubbish, touristy, wasternised and lots and lots of hassel due to the extreme poverty just behind the affluent waterfront, our campsite was so sos so so windy and sandy, we did however find a lovely resturant and matt took claire for a lovely meal because she still felt poorly,

¤too cheer ourselfs up we rented a car for 4 days to take off southwards to explore the lesser known morocco,

we....
discovered amazing argan oil and bought a big big bottle from a happy bloke on the side of the road,

drove to tafraoute which was hot and beautiful in the middle of the anti atlas the most dramatic mountains matt has ever seen!
we bought claire some pretty moroccan shoes, matt knows the proper word as always...babouches

we then drove further south the next day...too the desert! the beginning of the Sahara! didnt see any big sand dunes just rocky wilderness,

we visited an oasis with lots of palm trees, but found people to be very odd in a scary way so retreated to some hotsprings to set up camp! claire had a swim in the ladies only srings and was a real hit with her cool (blonde) hair! unfortunately there were also strange people there and we were kept up in the night by wife beating and plain madness!

we obviously skidaddled in the morning... We got completely off the beaten track, abandoning the tarmac for dirt tracks; we discovered an amazing, lush valley in the middle of the hot desert hills where a trickle of water had inspired people to settle and turn the landscape green!

We then headed back northwards, hitting the coast on the way; we stopped at a brilliant beach (no tourists, just moroccan lads larking about in the surf). We joined in the fun of confronting the huge waves - we got tossed and turned and battered and slept well that night... in Tiznit, the town where everyone wes trying to pick our pockets (so we retreated to the campsite and our tent).

Yesterday we returned to Essaouira, via the Souss-Massa National Park, Morocco's most important, to do some bird watching. Matt was thrilled... Claire doesn't like birds.

Bought more argan oiland returned to Essaouira. In an hour we'll be on a bus to Marrakech to catch the train to Rabat to stay with our new friend Najib.