Morocco!

  Fés, Morocco
Friday, September 16, 2005

We arrived in Africa 8 hours after boarding the ferry from Malaga, Spain. Melilla is right at the top of Morocco but is in fact Spanish territory. We only got to see 5 min of it before we got a bus to the border and crossed with no problems. Immediately we had to set our watches back 2 hours (bizarre! In the space of 1 min we gained 2 hours) and entered into the darkness of Morocco...

We had made friends with two English girls on the ferry over - Sarah and Jacky - and decided on safety in numbers. In hindsight a wise decision as it was pitch black, we had no local money and all the banks were closed! We convinced a taxi to take us to the nearest big town (Nador) where we got money out of the bank and headed for the bus station. Kirsty and I had no idea what we wanted to do so randomly got on the midnight bus to Fes, which was supposed to take 6 hours.... 6 hours later and we were only halfway to Fes, had filled up with an awesome breakfast, Kirsty had already had her ipod stolen, people were throwing up all over the place, and the bus assistant was winking at me constantly. We were having a ball!! Seriously, we loved it. Everyone was really friendly and we immediately felt the sense of community.


At lunchtime the next morning we finally arrived at Fes and found a hotel that let us camp out on the roof to save us a few pennies!


We then set about getting clean - and opted for the haman (communal Arabic baths). What an experience. All the guidebooks we have read say its next to impossible to get to know any females in Morocco. Well I can tell you that they all hang out at the baths and they are really REALLY friendly (and also have very large breasts!!) They took us under their wing and showed us the ropes, carted buckets of water around for us, let us hold their babies, and at the end of it all, insisted we ate couscous with them! And on top of that we got squeaky clean!


Over the next few days we set about exploring the alleys and markets of Fes. Fes is known as the cultural capital of Morocco and is the base for many artisans. We visited the tannery, an orphanage, an historical academic centre and various small handicraft shops and loved every second of it.


One of our more unusual experiences was a visit to the local police station to file a report for Kirsty's stolen ipod. We had to wait 4 hours. The police used a typewriter and made carbon copies (!! I didn't know such things existed any longer) - in between beating up the prisoners!! Seriously - in front of us one of the police officers started slapping and kicking two boys in custody. They must have only been 16 or so. We bit our lip and looked down. Shame on us.


In spite of our experience with the police and not speaking any French, we are loving Morocco so far. Tomorrow (with a bit of luck) we are getting the bus down south to the border close to Algeria where we have been told we can do camel safari's into the desert.

Speak to you all soon!


xxxx