Couch Surfing

The best thing about Couch Surfing is the inside information that you can glean about the country you are visiting and hopefully they learn a little about yours as well. We have been very fortunate in that we have had 3 different perspectives from three wonderful hosts. This time we had Hassan who we were going to stay with then travel to his home town with but as Nick was sick and reluctant to travel too far we only had the chance to get to be with him for one day. Hassan is 22 and is a very old for his young years. He is typical of most Moroccans we have met in that he really wants to travel overseas but doesn’t see in the near future that that is going to happen. His family own an olive farm and also grow grapes so it would have been great to visit his family. We travelled with him to Moulay Idriss which was a hillside town a 30 min taxi ride away….once again we were sardines with barely breathing space with 7 in a taxi for 5. The walk up to the top of the village was wonderful. The views very scenic. Down again for a 45 min walk through the olive trees. It was glorious walking in the sunshine chatting to Hussan about all sorts of things. We walked to Volubilis which is the site of the only Roman ruins in Morocco. It was weird to see them there perched on top of the rolling hills. Morocco grows the majority of its own fruit and veg so has a lot of fertile land which is evident as we overlooked the expanse of hills in front of us. We decided to walk back after viewing quite a few mosiacs and a lot of ruins. They are not preserving what they have excavated. I guess the money is not there for that…other priorities. We met up with Patrick, a French Cser, staying with Hussan so the four of us walked the 4.5 kms back. I was wiped after that plus all the stairs we encountered that day. We had a sad farewell again as we could not stay longer with Hussan….maybe another day. We both thank him a lot and were so sorry we could not meet some of his family. We arrived by train to Fes railway station at night.. The station is new and was beautifully fitted out with the most incredible entrance. It was a great start to a fantastic time in Fes