Hello everybodyyyy! It’s a brand new week and hopefully it’s a good one! I have been hardcore slacking on my travel posts. I know I still have to share my Finland adventures with you, and I promise – I will definitely give you the 411 ASAP! A week feels like a day when you are on vacation, but when you have to write about it… you can’t stop with the ideas and the amount of information that you gained. With that being said, I wanted to share a part of my Morocco trip to get things started! F U N in F E S!
Stay at Palais Amani
I must say, we had quite an experience getting to Palais Amani. The first night of my Moroccan journey was spent in Rabat, followed by a 2.5 hour taxi ride to Fes. This hotel is hidden in the pathway that leads to the major Souk area, therefore, there isn’t a real entrance. I climbed up about 40-50 steps, knocked on the handle of a random door which was opened by a guard, took a few steps past the foyer and looked around in complete shock. This hotel is unbelievable. I got to experience staying in a Riad while indulging into a bit of luxury for 2 nights, in a loft style suite. Where do I begin? My room led right onto the patio with a huge fountain and gorgeous seating. Palais Amani is filled with beautiful tiles that can keep you captured for days on end. They have a delicious breakfast menu with CHOCOLATE on their cappuccinos AND there is a terrace bar where you can lounge out and easily forget the time. It seemed like I was in a magical land. I fell in absolute love with this place.
Visit the Chouara Tannery
Brace yourselves, because I’m about to get into some fun details about pigeon poop 😉 The very first touristy thing that I did was visit the Tannery, which happened to be a few steps away from the hotel I stayed at.
Background: This tannery has been operating for thousands of years. Raw skin is brought and soaked in a mixture of cow and pigeon feces, mixed with different colored dyes and water. The dyes come from all natural products, such as indigo, pomegranate, henna, saffron and many others.
It was super cool seeing the process. They hand you a sprig of mint to keep near your nose, because the smell is HARDCORE – but after a while you just get used to it. This tannery is connected to a store of multiple levels, carrying all of the leather goods that they process. They have so many different items, in every color possible. It was a great experience to see this and also a cultural understanding because it’s a huge part of Fes.
Make some argon oil
You know when you see Moroccan Argon oil? – well yes, its from Morocco 😉 I walked through the whole process of how it’s made, and got to smell/try all of the concoctions that they make using argon oil! The whole store was filled with soaps, lotions, oils, shampoo, beauty products… you know name – they had it. It was a really unique experience, and I ended up buying a little more than I should have. Whoops….
Eat at Le Patio Bleu
Okay – for me, this restaurant was great. Finding vegetarian Moroccan food was a bit difficult, so I was definitely bummed out when I couldn’t try most of the local food. There may be other restaurants in Fes that are fantastic, but this was right in the souks and it reminded me of home. Moroccan cuisine has a lot of similarity to Indian food. They use pungent spices, and there are a lot of vegetables in a curry-ish form. I had lunch here and I was for sure happy about it 🙂
Walk the Souks
This was obviously the highlight of my trip. The souks are a maze (and amaze), and you do NOT want to go without a tour guide. A 5 hour guide is about 600 Durham for 4 people, and is highly recommended because once you go in, everything looks the same! Not only was this a unique shopping experience, it was also a history lesson. We went down a whole ally with people selling copper kitchen utensils, known as Copper Square. Yes – I was tempted to buy every single thing. We walked through an old University which was hand carved by the Israeli architects back in the day. Lastly, another very memorable stop was a rug shop that we visited. This store used to be an old house before it was turned into a business. I can’t even explain how intricate these rugs are. They are hand made by local men and women, and they have some of the coolest prints I’ve ever seen! I’m looking forward to the time I actually buy a house and can go back to decorate!!
Overall, I had the most amazing time in Fes. I was only there for about 2 days, so I tried to get in as much as I could. To be honest, I think we did a fairly decent job with exploring the city! I feel so fortunate to have been able to include Fes into our itinerary for Morocco, and being able to visit in general. I can’t wait to share the rest of my Morocco trip with you!
Fes –> Marrakech 🙂
