INTERVIEWER: It was in many ways a socialtrip,wasn't it?
CHARLES: Yes,yes...we'd arranged to meet up withfriends at various points on the journey.I mean thiswas actually one of the purposes of the trip...and wemanaged to keep all these dates,which is amazingreally considering the detours we made.An old friendacted as a sort of transport organiser for everyoneand hte Hotel Ali in Marrakech was a good socialbase-I'd really recommend it,although I can'tremember who runs it.Andway,groups of friendsactually joined us for three-week stints and others just linked up with us.Some,whom we hadn'tmet before the trip at all,tagged on for short bursts-people from the area-who just came alongfor the tide.But outside the major visitor areas like Toubkal we only met one other group oftravellers like ourselves in the whole 96 days.