Fes - What, No Hats!

My tales of our misadventures in Morocco thus far may give the impression that the whole city was like the Medina.  Actually, most people do not want to have to run into the likes of us blundering around and choose to live in the very modern part of the city.  Our only glimpse of this (in daylight at any rate) was when we made our way to the railway station to start the journey to Fes.  This was a large and modern building.

Some of these lanes get really narrow

While travelling on the train, we read about Fes because that's the kind of long-range planning we do, which is also why we arrive in places on religious holidays...  Apparently, its souks are far larger and far more complicated than Marrakech's.  Terrific!  Based on our navigational skills shown to-date, we decided that a guide might be the better option.  Dirham (the Pink Panther's favourite currency - dirham, dirham...) well-spent we figured.  And so it was.  The next morning, after a few turns, we were deep into the labyrinth.

The biggest pile of pigeon poop in Morocco

The souks are organised by trade, so the brass is in one area, the leather in another, the shoes in another.  No department stores then.  There are over 9400 steps (as in up and down - it's hilly here) and over 170 mosques in Fes (prayer call sounds like the start of a grand prix).  There was another tannery, the oldest and largest in the country but we were experts now and were used to the smell or, as its termed by the locals, Coco Caca...

The brass district

The town's also host to the world's first university, although the doors of this were closing as we arrived.  Are you picking up a theme here?  In actuality we would not have been allowed through the doors in any case, as we weren't studying to be imams (which is all it teaches now)...but the door was closing nonetheless.

Closing time - go away (actually he was very ok)

But we could sneak a look from the other side

With this city being build around AD 900, there are a lot of old buildings still intact.  And, Paul, not the guide, tells me that in fact it is the world's largest car-free zone.  This, actually, is great.  Only the odd donkey or mule to negotiate and not the scores of motorcycles you encounter in Marrakech.

Those are gas cannisters - in other words, one explosive mule!

There was also of course the mandatory visit to the carpet shop where, amazingly, they get their merino wool thanks to Dave Dobbyn (as in Slice of Heaven fame) who organised it all after visiting there.  It's a Unicef project, so no child labour is involved.  Actually, the rugs were amazing, with the highest quality ones actually changing colour in the shifting light but I couldn't spring for the $1200.  And there were visits to silk weaving shops although there were some rather shifty characters in there:

Look out!  It's half a Berbershop Quartet!

Dave's Slice of Carpet Shop

After working our way through the trade districts and blithely turning down the chance to buy stuff, we reached the other end of the Medina with the famous blue gate.  Which is actually green when you first see it (from the inside).  It's blue on the other side...Green is the colour of Islam, Blue is the colour of Fes (and a couple of English football teams but I let that slide).

The Blue Gate 

After this it was back to our riad.  And this was just the morning!  This was followed by a relaxing afternoon in our beautiful riad as we watched the sun set on the distant hills.  This holiday thing is hard work!

Next stop: Lisbon.