Two if by land, one if by sea

Day 42
After discussing our options far later than we should have we decided to go forward with our plans to visit Morocco and were up before dawn to catch a bus.

We had to take several different types of transportation to get to Fez. First we spent about 2 hours on a bus to Algerceras, then we spent another 3 hours on a ferry, we ended with a 6 hour train ride from Tangier to Fez.

Immigration to Morocco was painless. Once through we were approached by a guy who told us that he was just there to help and that he was an official guy. He gave us good information (except for an incorrect train time) and didn´t ask for any money. I guess he was telling the truth.

We did not have such a nice experience on the train. Some guy sat in the compartment that we were sharing with an elderly couple. He heard us speaking and in very good English told us that he was about to marry an Australian and that he worked at the Tangier tourist booth and was hoping to open his own tourist company at some point. He gave us the name of a place to stay and the name of a guide and his number. We didn´t trust him. He did find out from us that we lived in NYC (we didn´t mention my trip) and, upon hearing Al speak Spanish to the elderly couple, that Al was Uruguayan. The shady guy eventually left saying he needed the bathroom. He was gone for about 2 hours.

Eventually he came back to just leave again minutes later. We figured that he had found an easier target. At this point another guy comes in to the booth. He starts talking to us, ask us where we are from. When we say NYC he tells Al that he doesn´t look like he is from NY, but rather from South America. That was just too weird, and we figured that the two shady guys were in cahoots. The second guy left and we didn´t see him again.

Eventually the elderly couple, who were on the train until 11pm at night, figured out that there was an empty compartment and went to move. We offered to do so instead. When we got to Fez we both needed the bathrooms and were behind the rest of the passengers in departing the station. I didn´t see it, but Al saw both shady guys walking together, when they saw us, one of them jumped behind a column. Clearly they were trying something, what we didn´t know, and I guess it didn´t matter because they didn´t get it.

After wandering for a bit we settled on an uber cheap but not so great hotel. We were too tired and it was too late in the day to accomplish anything more than dinner and passing out in our room.