By the time we'd got over the highest part of the High Atlas, it had started to rain.  As we came down through the plains towards Marrakesh, we noticed some of the little streams were starting to overflow, and fields starting to look really quite damp.  Then we came round a corner and realised we weren't going any further - rivers here can overrun bridges at a moment's notice.  Sadly, after turning round, we realised we weren't going back either: the little overflowing streams of ten minutes ago had now become rivers overrunning bridges too.  We could sit and wait, or take the advice of the strangely animated man standing out in the rain, and take the little unmarked road out into the middle of nowhere ...

We were trying to get to Marrakesh to stay with a Moroccan family: Jean-jacques Gérard had arranged for us to stay with his in-laws, and we were excited to see what real Moroccan home cooking was like.  They say that the best food here is in people's homes, and we'd started to suspect that there was something in this.  We'd realised that lots of the interesting stuff is done by women: this means it's usually done at home - so you don't come across it on the standard tourist trail.

For example, finding the women who know how to make couscous the old-fashioned way, rolling it by hand, had taken us quite a while (although we managed it in the end).  Our new mission was to find the women who make warka ...

We didn't quite know what to expect from Morocco - we'd heard very different and conflicting reports.  To some people, it's the home of one of the world's classic cuisines, and some of the best street food you'll find anywhere; to others, it's apparently an interminable round of underspiced vegetable tagines.  Which would we find?

We knew some things, of course - but there was a lot more we didn't know.  We knew they ate a lot of couscous here - but what is it actually made of, and how?  We had to make it our mission to find out.  (Our friend Robert told us we really didn't need to go all the way to Morocco for this - just buy a packet from Waitrose and pour boiling water on it.  And he has a point.  But it turned out there's a lot more to it than that).

And we knew they drank a lot of tea, too.  But we really weren't expecting the crumpets ...