Having discovered the Painted Lady in the Draa Valley we could have gone two directions - further east to delineate the eastern limit of its winter distribution in Morocco or back to the Souss Valley and then Marrakech and its surrounds to collect more caterpillars and start winding down. We vote for winding down. A trip east would have been exciting but we have already criss-crossed over most of southern Morocco and it has been exhilarating but exhausting....

We need a bath. Not in an Irish way of needing a bath - but in a Moroccan way of needing one. We have been travelling for weeks in the hot, arid landscape and looking for Painted Lady caterpillars on the sides of dusty, dirty Moroccan roads. On top of that we have been staying in budget hotels where the washing facilities are variable (one shower, for example, threatened to explode when you turned on the hot water!). So although we are clean to look at from a d...

We find ourselves in the town of Agdz in the Draa Valley (amazingly pronounced with four syllables - and we really enjoy saying it over and over!). It has a vibrant central square filled with the usual transport vehicles as well as a bustling souk (market), open-air cafes, car mechanics, butchers, grocers, bakeries and hairdressers. We are now used to the hustle and bustle of Moroccan towns and settle in at one of the cafes for a dinner of chicken kebabs, kefta...

We are at a crossroads. We have been finding much fewer Painted Ladies than we had expected. We have only 12 caterpillars for the parasite study and this is too small for any statistics. So what should we do? We had planned to go on from Tafraoute to the town of Tata which is on the edge of the Sahara desert and then on to the Draa Valley which has never been investigated for Painted Lady butterflies. Constanti's theory is that the Souss Valley around Taroudant...

We are very sad to leave Auberge Figue de Barbarie, the lovely, lovely coastline, and the little towns of Sidi Ifni and Mirleft (we all hope that we will return someday). Up and over the hills we reluctantly drive and onto the flat expanse of dry landscape before the town of Tiznit. We spot some thistles and decide to stop. Lots of empty caterpillar nests. Hmmm... the Painted Lady has been here too! On the outskirts of Tiznit is another of Constanti's sites. Bu...