Thursday. Lunch at a kasbah owned by Richard Branson, deep in the Atlas Mountains. Yeah, we’re really going for the authentic Marrakesh experience, I know. An air conditioned people carrier, equipped with bottles of water and freshly laundered flannels and driven by a man called Hamid, picked us up outside Dar El Bacha and took us for an hour-long drive south, across bleak but beautiful terrain. Hamid taught us some words of Arabic; we repeated them back to him and then forgot them immediately. Yep, the authentic Marrakesh experience.

Lunch was in an utterly absurd setting, but it had the advantage of providing the ideal backdrop for the long awaited photo of the Englishman Abroad. We discussed with the chef the harsh realities of obtaining fresh, seasonal, local produce when virtually in the sodding desert, and were then driven back to Marrakesh in an air conditioned people carrier, equipped with bottles of water and freshly laundered flannels and driven by a man called Abdul.

It’s profoundly irritating that the whole trip is centred around food and I’m shitting my arse off, but it follows a pattern throughout my life that if I do have some kind of gastric complaint, there’s always a huge amount of impressive food on offer soon after. This evening we wandered across “Big Square” as English tourists call it, and checked out the food stalls, particularly number 14, a fish stall which was highly recommended by a man called Abdollah. As we passed, a young Moroccan approached us from the stall and said “Come and eat, great food, better than Fanny Cradock Nigella Lawson Big Tits”, which was incredibly amusing. I’m sure the hygiene of stall 14 is impeccable, but we scuttled away to (I’m ashamed to say) a pizzeria, which served up quite the most pathetic excuse for a pizza I’ve come across in a long time (NB to Time Out editors reading this: remove the pizza joint you recommend from the book, thanks.)

I’m now sitting au balcon back at the riad, contemplating a 6am alarm call for the journey back to London, which I hope I don’t spend sitting on an aeroplane toilet.