Morocco – Fes 19/10/16

Day 4
Today we were up and ready for our mini bus to leave by 9am. We were taken on a guided tour of the Kings Palace, a very rich and vibrant building, however the king was in residence so we could only visit it’s external walls and elaborate ornate entrance. What a beautiful entrance it was made up of 7 doors as this is a lucky number in the Muslim world. Each one beautifully crafted in bronze, all hand carved with mesmerizing designs. All were surrounded by extravagant hand made tiles made up of thousand upon thousands of piece of mosaic in traditional colours – red, green, black, yellow and white. As the sun shone down on the doors, they gave off a brilliant haze bright and shiny.
Then we were off to the Medina of Fes. A massive area which stretches 6km and made up of 2000 streets. Gladly our guide was with us throughout. The streets themselves can get very narrow, with only enough room for single filed people, and if someone passed you in the other direction you had to turn sideways and press your back against the wall. The buildings on either side of these long narrow cobbled streets were sometimes 5 or 6 stories high with long dark alleyways leading off them, impressive as they remained cool in the heat of the day, as the sun did not penetrate onto us. Other streets were wide enough for 2 way walking, however the only form of transport were donkeys, stacked up high of deliveries and when these came passed you again you were pressed against the walls, highly amusing. During our tour of the Medina (which lasted 5+ hours), we were taken to a silk factory where the locals were weaving silk into fabric which was then turned into garments such as scarves, bed/furniture covers etc. We also visited and toured a small tile making factory, where men would sit and hand chip tiles into small pieces, including delicate shapes like 6 pointed stars, making them into the most intricate beautifully designed vases, plates, ornaments, trinkets and table tops. Nest we toured through a huge tannery, where they cleaned the carcases of cows, separated the skins, dyed them and turned them into garments, jackets, bags etc. This place smelt atrocious, they did give us a sprig of fresh mint as we walked in, but I felt it did not do enough to take the pungent aroma away. Totally stomach churning, enough to make anyone turn vegetarian! Lastly we visited a family run metal works where we were shown many traditional artefacts with delicate designs in bronze, silver and other metals. They made table tops, teapots, wall plaques and of course lanterns. We were intrigued with these, memorized by the lights shining through the carved metal work and stained glass. Tina’s first response was that it was like a child in a sweet shop! There were hundreds hanging from every inch of ceiling space, all individual, all magnificent, all gleaming – each one appearing to shout to Tina, “buy me, buy me”. One of these caught our eye and a salesman hurried along to us as we stood underneath it in a trance. Yes within 15 minutes I was in an office with the credit card out, however I must say my hackling skills have greatly improved over our trip and we got it for an impressive small amount of money. Now we’ve just got to find a post office and post it back to NZ! What a great day.