Being the complete and utter tight arses that we are we decided to move into the cheaper room we had originally booked. The room is half the price (£6 for a double room) and exactly the same but without the view of the sea. I think the owner always puts people in the rooms with views to begin with in the hope that you will love it and not bother to change. We left our hotel and turned onto the main street and our noses led us directly to a food stall. There was a woman standing over a hot plate making square pancake type things, they smelt beautiful. We ordered one each and they were served with a completely unhealthy helping of butter and honey. We walked out of the relative comfort of the medina ... read more

We had a slight sleep in today and got up at ten for breakfast. Our primary goal for today was figuring out the onward part of our journey. We knew that Essaouira was our next stop, so we walked to the bus station to get the tickets. Lonely Planet said that there were nine daily buses there with a company called CTM who charged 60dh. Just as soon as we stepped foot in the entrance of the station, a guy came over and asked where we were going. He told us his company went there for 45dh and went at a good time whilst CTM only appeared to do one a day. I agreed and we bought the tickets, but as we were leaving Rob voiced his concern that the guy had just pocketed 10dh each ... read more

Breakfast was more fun than usual because we had the company of lots of little birds which enjoyed our breakfast with us. We spent a while enjoying the courtyard and watching the birds and then headed into Djemaa el-fna in the medina. We phoned Hicham and he said he would meet us upstairs in café France in the square. We both ordered Jus d'orange and sat and watched everyone going about their business and dodging hustlers etc. When Hicham arrived we chatted a while and then followed him to his workplace. We walked through more of the backstreets and there was so much to see. We must have gone through a very poor area because the smell was unbearable in some places. There was a little street market where kids were selling fruits that looked well ... read more

Breakfast was surprisingly good with a huge glass of freshly squeezed orange juice. We sat in the courtyard and ate surrounded by orange trees. Whilst we ate we consulted our guidebooks to see where we should begin our explorations. Eventually we decided to stick to our routine for the first day in a city and just wander and get lost. We walked the correct way into the medina and suffered immensely in the heat. The main avenue Mohammad 5 leads straight from our hotel into the medina. The road in was crazy and just so chaotic with little observable regulation for traffic. Roads were impossible to cross and the dust and emissions from the vehicles clouded the air. This all sounds horrific the way I write it, but it was such a culture shock with so ... read more

This was one of our later mornings as we slept in to half nine. It was a rough night due to a group of inconsiderate Americans. Breakfast was terrible because there was nothing left and the dining room was packed. Unusually the internet was working so we uploaded our first blogs of Barcelona and we even managed to upload pictures. We really wanted to buy some toilet roll for Morocco so we walked to a few supermarkets we knew and they were all closed, as were all the shops. I know this is normal but I just assumed that Barcelona would always be open. As we walked to the main square at the top of the Ramblas we saw a protest of some kind. At closer examination we guessed that it was an anti-capitalism march aimed ... read more