Back to Fes

No visit to Morocco is complete with a visit to the ancient city of Fes, so I took my nephews there for a weekend experience. Again I stayed with the wonderful Josephine at Dar El Hana again, where she and cook Fatima had a wonderful meal awaiting when we arrived about 9 pm. We had to catch the train from Rabat after I finished work, hence the late arrival. Four courses we feasted on: first Harira followed a number of cooked salads then the main course a Fatima creation joking called "Chin Wah" chicken where Moroccan cuisine gains a Chinese flavour. A chicken cooked with noodles flavoured with finely sliced olives and chilli. It certainly made a nice change from couscous, which I am not a fan of, and tagine, which we had had twice a day for most of the previous week when travelling around the south. To finish off we had home-made orange cake containing orange rind, just like my mother makes, which was served with fresh strawberries.

The Blue Gate

In an effort to ensure my nephews learned more of the history and architecture of Fes than what I new, and hopefully I would learn something to (I did!) I organised a guide through Josephine. So in three hours we went from Bab Boujloud, the Blue Gate, to the tanneries. We visited the Medersa Bouinania, which I hadn't been to before. It had some wonderful craftmanship on display: carved plasterwork, painted cedar ceilings, detailled zellij or mosaics and some nice stained glass windows in the women's section.

Above: the Medersa Bouinania

We peeked into the Moulay Idriss Mausoleum because as non-muslims we could not enter, looked at the attractive entrance to the Nejjarine Complex and passed the Qaraouiyine Mosque, which we could also not enter. In between were the narrow of often dark alleys of the souks bordered by small shops with colourful carpets piled high, blue and white Fes pottery stacked high, colourful spices piled high into perfect cones and a rainbow of djellebahs hanging from overhanging verandahs.The finale, and probably the highlight for the boys was the tanneries. The large semi-circular pits we looked down on were filled with red, yellow, brown and maroon. The dye pits, using natural dyes are used to colour the animal skins - sheep, goat or cattle. In the background are the white pits where the skins are soaked to remove the wool and hair.

We spent one of our days while in Fes taking a grand taxi to the Roman ruins and mosaics of Volubulis. With this being my third visit to Volubulis and second to Meknes, the highlight of the day for me was the visit to the revered town of Moulay Idriss. Here is Morocco's only cylindrical mosque minaret, dark green and covered in Arabic text from the Koran. Also here is the Mausoleum of Moulay Idriss, again it can only be glimpsed by non-Muslims. But good views of the mausoleum and picture postcard views of the symmetrical white-washed town on the hill I did get to see.

Moulay Idriss above, below the cylindrical minaret

While there I heard about a village south of Fes where people live in caves and the women sit out the front making djellebah buttons. It certainly sounds interesting but will have to wait for another visit.