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Published: July 22nd 2010
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After a mint tea and croissant for breakfast, I jumped on the next train to Fes. A slightly shorter journey than the one I had taken to Rabat at only 3 and a half hours, and more comfortable in a much better air conditioned carriage.
To my annoyance upon exiting the train station I was confronted with the now all too familiar touts, although there seemed to be less than in Marrakech. After a longer walk than expected to where my hotel was supposed to be, I came across a problem, it wasn't there. I decided to ask the irritating toothless man who had been following me around if he had heard of it. He told me that it was in the Medina, about a mile and a half from where I thought. Blast…. Still wanting to stay in the Ville Nouvelle and away from the Medina madness, I spent a considerable about of time in the heat going from hotel to hotel to locate a cheap room. I came up trumps on the fourth establishment I tried, coincidentally with the same name as my accommodation in Rabat, the Hotel Central. A nice, airy and bright room with a comfy
bed, although the facilities did leave a lot to be desired. I must also stress that if you want to meet fellow travellers at your hotel, this isn't the place for it. Somewhere like Hotel Cascade is supposed to be much better for this, I did try to pre-book a room here, but given its popularity the hotel was full.
After recovering from the heat I walked over to the medina, an exciting prospect given that Fes' medina was the largest in the whole country. Sure enough, it was a huge expanse of narrow passages, with motorbikes and donkey drawn carts barrelling down each road. I took the Talaa Seghira, one of the main passages, which seemed to be almost never ending. The guide books all yammer on about 'getting lost' in the medina, taking random side streets and discovering intriguing things along the way, but to be honest, there didn't seem to be much going on off the main passageways. After walking for some time, I decided to walk back to the entrance of Bab Bou Jeloud, where most of the budget eateries are clustered. After looking around a few places and trying to ignore the owners begging me to eat at their establishments, I ate a place called Thami's. A great little place to sit and watch the hordes go by through the Medina, with some great dirt cheap couscous to boot.
The Baghdaji Square by the entrance to Bab Bou Jeloud was a particularly nice place to sit and people watch. The square is pretty much empty during the day but in the evening when the large steps are nicely shaded it becomes full of people going to meet each other, talk, play what I assume is backgammon and so on, whilst others crowd around to hear stories told or play gambling games. One that had me particularly bemused involved a guinea pig somehow.... It may not have had quite the atmosphere of Marrakech's Djemaa El-Fna but it was a great place to sit and people watch as the sun set.
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