Vacances d'hiver: Fes

Saturday, March 2nd was our last day in Chefchaouen, and we spent the morning wandering a little bit more, shopping a little bit as well. Then around noon we went to the bus station and got on the bus to Fes, which took 5 hours...luckily I fell asleep for almost the entire bus ride, which was good. Once we got to Fes we got to our hostel, called Funky Fes, and checked in. We didn't do much that night because we were tired and were too afraid of getting lost, so we just walked a little bit in a straight path in the medina, which was really cool--the streets are SO tiny and narrow and SO crowded, but it has a really amazing atmosphere. However, we got a lot of (bad) attention from some men again. Actually, we got a lot of attention on our way to the medina, but on the way back Louise took her scarf and covered her hair and we got much less attention (she's blonde), which was interesting. We got back to the hostel and had dinner there; we ate chicken pastela, which is a type of dish with chicken wrapped in a puff pastry with sugar and cinnamon sprinkled on top, and it was really good.

Hostel lobby!

Chicken pastela

We also met these two girls who turned out to be teaching assistants as well! They're teaching assistants in this town called Albi, which is near Toulouse. Their names are Mary and Louise (coincidence? I think not!), and they were from England and Ireland, respectively. They were hilarious to talk to and it was really fun meeting them, but they left that night (after we went to bed) because they were going to Marrakesh.

The next morning at the hostel, we met these two Asian girls staying in the same room as us who were from Australia (well, technically one was from China and one was from Malaysia, but they are living in Australia) named Celine and Tracy, and it turns out Tracy had actually been to Morocco before and so we ended up spending the day with them! We started out by going to this place called Cafe Clock for breakfast. Well, they had breakfast, Louise and I just got hot sweet almond milk, which is SO GOOD.

Hot sweet almond milk. Yum.

Berber eggs, which Tracy and Celine got! I tried some and it was really delicious.

Then we went and saw the Bou Inania madrasa (madrasa means an educational institution), which was very beautiful, as well as the water clock (Google it, it's pretty cool), and then a Moroccan guy that Tracy knows, Mohamed, came and met up with us and he ended up showing us around the medina, which was awesome because we would've gotten SO lost if we had tried to see it ourselves. The medina in Fes is much bigger than the one in Marrakech.

Bou Inania madrasa

Water clock!

So Mohamed took us to see the University of Al-Karaouine, which is apparently the oldest university in the world, and then we went into a carpet shop to see the view from the rooftop, but we ended up just hanging out in one of the rooms there talking to the shopkeepers, who gave us tea, and Louise and Celine ended up bargaining with them for two blankets, haha. We did go up to see the view from the rooftop, which was amazing. Then after that, Mohamed took us to the tanneries (where they make leather), which was really cool, and we got to see them from the roof of this leather shop because that's really the only good way to see them, since you can't actually go INTO the tanneries because that's where they work. After that we walked around a little more, then went to this cafe and I got an avocado shake, which was SO good omfg.

University--we couldn't go in because it's also a mosque.

New friends in a carpet shop!

View from carpet shop rooftop

Tanneries!

Avocado shake. AMAZING.

Then we went back to the hostel to chill out for a while, and later we went back to Cafe Clock because there was a concert going on that night. It was traditional Moroccan music, and there was NO alcohol involved but people were still like, getting up and dancing like crazy--it was hilarious and also really awesome to watch. I also danced a little bit, haha.

The band!

Dance circle lol

We also met more of Tracy's friends at the cafe (she basically knew all the employees because she went there every day last time she was in Fes), and we all talked a bit and got to know each other, which was really great. More friends on Facebook! Yay! Haha.

So after the cafe, we went back to the hostel. I met more people when I got back because I went up to the rooftop where I found four people drinking gin and Coke, and I ended up sitting down and talking with them for the rest of the night. Two of them were from Australia (Jack and Alex; Alex is a girl) and two of them were from Holland, both girls (Etta and Astrid). They were all really nice and we talked for a long time; we had to move off the terrace into the main lounge at one point because we were being too loud. Anyway, we talked for a while and it was a lot of fun! Even more Facebook friends now, haha. But that was my last night in Morocco--the next morning I left for the airport and got back to Nîmes that evening. And thus ends my trip to Morocco. I miss it! I had such an amazing time and got to meet so many great people--I think it may be my favorite vacation so far.