As we arrived almost in darkness yesterday, we never really had the chance to take in the surrounding area and views from the hotel. As early risers, Karen and I decided to have a quick walk before breakfast, so headed outside.

The hotel is called Riad Paradise of Silence (well it was silent until we got there last night!) and is situated away from the main village just on a small hill overlooking the area. We climbed up to the top of the hill behind it and found some amazing views, including the famous red-walled Kasbah.

We had a really nice breakfast, a good look around the riad, which is actually really beautiful and filled with nice art and lots of interesting objects, then packed up and go to see the kasbah close up.

Unfortunately, Marion and Anne decided it was too much walking for them and some pressing engagements at home meant that we would part company at this point. It was easier for them to head home from here, a pretty much direct route to Agadir, then travel over the pass to Marrakesh and back that way.

It was really sad to see them leave as we had such fun and many laughs over the last few days.

We parked up in the village and headed to the kasbah. It is a short walk from the main road, over a footbridge, and into the labyrinth of small alleys (which we did not expect) filled with artisans and products – a mini souk.

We slowly weaved our way around the small alleyways, making our way up to the top of the kasbah to admire the views. I wanted to see where Gladiator was filmed – some really famous scenes from one of my all-time favorite films.

There is a cafe on the top section which gives views of where the scenes were filmed and you can sit and enjoy a coffee here. It’s hard to imagine a whole set was built here and then dismantled without leaving a trace.

Obviously, Karen cannot go past a shop selling beautiful things….so it took some time to get around – had we known what was here, we would have allocated more time to explore, but time was pressing and we had a long way to go – not in terms of distance, but in terms of time – the sat nav said 8 hours to do 380km.

Little did we know this would be so much more!