Land of Olives

The train from Marrakech to Fes takes about 8 hours, which allows us plenty of opportunity to observe that, wherever you are in the world, trains never run through nice neighborhoods. They do, however, pass through some beautiful landscapes, which we observed between naps and snacks of junk food. Among those were miles and miles of olive orchards. One of the pleasant surprises has been that Morocco is a land of olives. Each meal begins with a small plate of them and we’ve had a tremendous variety of excellent olives. Our limited vocabulary – kalamata, luques, nicoises, arnaud – is sure to grow. We’ve already had mild black romie olives for breakfast and a heartier black bledie olive in the evening. Red olives cured with lemons for an aperetif. And many more whose names we’ve yet to learn.