Nicholas & Kathryn go AWOL

Well it's been a couple of weeks since I last got on here, trouble with being in some of these countries. Just checked where I left off....the Edinburgh Military Tattoo was absolutely fantastic, as you will see by Nicholas' album on facebook. My favourite was when they played Amazing Grace with the full pipe band. The next morning we caught a 7am flight to Faro in Portugal where we spent 2 days in the sun. Then we cruised up the road to a place near Obidos to stay with some friends we met on the Paddywagon tour and their parents (two of the Aussie girls are sisters). We spent 2 nights with them also. They had a holiday house rented out and a people mover so we got around a bit seeing the sights. Had a few swims which was great, also being that it is Summer after all!!! From there we went back to Lisbon for three nights. Did all the touristy things, went up to the castle, walked through the streets and checked out the markets. We quite liked Lisbon and it's easy to use Metro system. On the mornin of Friday 28th Aug we got an 8.5 hour bus to Madrid. Luckily for us the bus seats were better than any plane seat we'd been in! We caught up with some Aussie mates again for dinner that night and had paella (like rice risotto) my fav Spanish dish so far! The following morning we flew to Marrakech, Morocco. We had some trouble getting through customs as we didn't know the address of where we were staying! The policeman rolled his eyes, stamped our passport and let us go!!! WHEW! We spent the Saturday night in Marrakech where we met our tour guide and supposedly our our group, however we were the only two on it!!!!! There was another tour group of two people also that would start the journey with us and then we would carry on through the valleys and passes and they climbed Mt Toubkal. So for the next 5 days we climbed over 5 passes. The highest pass was 2450m. Some were easier than others, a lot were quite rocky which was ok on the way up but on the way back down we slid everywhere. The berber villages were interesting. In the middle of such barron country you find a lush green valley full of walnut groves and apple trees. The toilet facilities left a lot of be desired, we would go as far to say we would have rather gone outdoors!!! Got back to Marrakech on Thursday afternoon. Both Nicholas and I then had the misfortune of getting gastro, which at the time of writing we are still recovering from! We are meer shawdows of our former selves now!!! haha. Got back to Madrid this afternoon where we managed to eat something and have kept down (yay). We have another night in Madrid, then on to Valencia and Barcelona. The weather is still quite nice, in the 30's, but nowhere to swim in Madrid which is why we are booked in to a hostel near the beach in Valencia!!!