Aug 18 – Tour of Fes

We meet up with our guide in front of our hotel and begin our whirlwind tour of Fes. Of all the cities we visited, Fes was the one that most certainly required a guide to navigate the streets. The word ‘maze’ hardly begins to describe the narrow, winding streets with hairpin turns and random underpasses all absolutely packed with people.

One of our first stops was the Nejjarine Museum of Wooden Arts and Crafts – also a restored funduq or merchant's inn where caravans-people would stop with their livestock and goods while in the city. The building was rather different from the palaces we had seen in its use of wood, but it was very striking with the gleaming wood against plaster.

Next, we saw various medersas and mausoleums. Ancient wooden doors, the elaborate carvings nearly worn away, have signs taped up saying “Interdit aux non-Musulmans. Merci pour votre comprehension”. We do manage to catch glimpses at the doorway but no clear photos. Instead I take pictures of the people in the streets on their way to pay homage to those interred at the mausoleum. It is easy to tell when one approaches one of these. Instead of tourist wares, the vendors near these sites sell tapers for burning and there are a large number of tour groups – camera-toting Europeans walking single file through the narrow streets.

The medersas are gorgeous – the complexity of the carvings still astound me. None of them are in use anymore – I believe after Morocco became a colony of France, children began attending Western-style schools.

Our second-last destination is the famed tanneries of Fes. We had read and heard terrible things about their stench and up till the last minute, were unsure of whether we actually wanted to visit them or not. Perhaps it was the surprise of our tourguide in hearing of our uncertainty that decided it. I’m glad we did – I’d seen this picture in tourist literature and postcards many times over, but seeing it in person is still pretty amazing. Those people working down there in those giant clay pots, this is their living. This is where all the leather we see in the tourist shops is processed. Not factories. The smell was strong but hardly as bad as we’d feared. Perhaps the wind was in our favour, but it was amusing to watch some guides instruct their tourgroups to hold mint leaves up to their noses to block the smell. I can’t see that it really helps; I think it is more for the amusement of the locals.

Our final destination was a pottery factory outside of the medina. For all we were ripped off by the cab-ride there, I found it pretty cool. We got to see the process of how they made pottery and mosaics from soup to nuts. There were the people spinning the clay at wheels, people assembling the coloured shapes for mosaics on the ground, people hand-drawing the geometric designs onto unfired plates. I bought my first three plates here. The picture you see is of us in another shop later that night where I bought my final fourth plate.

Next - Aug 19 – Last Morning in Fes