Tony and Liz's Travel Adventures: MOROCCO: Volubilis & Fez

Carvings in Rock on
Volubilis Pathway

VOLUBILIS - UNESCO World Heritage listed Archaeological site

Population: 0, Zero, Nil, Nada, Zilch

The Capitol, Volubilis

We started the morning with a light, very light breakfast, keeping in mind Ramadan, even feeling a little sorry for those who had to cook and lay out the breakfast. You could almost see their mouths watering, but their faith prevailed.

It was only about a 45 minute drive to Volubilis an archeological site near a town called Moulay Idriss. We drove through wheat fields that seemed to go on forever over rolling hills. Again it was dry, dusty and hot even at about 9am. Out of the blue and over a rise we then viewed these amazing ancient Roman ruins sitting on a high point and which we couldn’t imagine then, but had the best vantage point to overlook the valleys and fields beyond and to the high mountains in the distance.

We were to find out that Volubilis was the most southerly and westerley city of the ancient Roman empire. Our local guide gave us an insight into the history of Volubilis which suffered 2 earthquakes, one in the late 4th century (AD), then further distruction of the site in the same earthquake that destroyed most of Lisbon in 1755.

The Grand Via

It was recorded that this once vibrant and impressive Roman city with its bath houses, mosaic floors (many still intact), grand houses with just as grand courtyards, olive oil press (now restored), water channels and aquaducts and a grand Via was still inhabited by the Romans until around 270 BC, thereafter inhabited by the Berbers, then Arabs.

There are many examples of Roman designs, carvings and inscriptions which have been just left lying around the site, and a photo below shows one of the best examples of a pillar inscribed in Latin. If anyone can decipher the writings please let us know the meaning, cheers.

Restored Oil Press

Inscripted Ruins

For us in particular and our group we felt privileged that we had a chance to explore and climb around some of the best preserved Roman ruins in Morocco. It is recorded in history that during the 18^th century, by order of the rulers of the time, that the abandoned Volubilis marble ruins be used to build nearby cities such as Meknes and the village of Moulay Idriss which sits on the range overlooking Volubilis. Given this we were quite surprised about how well preserved the mosaics were considering that they were now exposed to the harsh elements of this region, not to mention pilfering of artefacts. Perhaps this preservation has much to do with the fact that the mosaic pieces were made from stones gathered in the area in and around Volubilis.

The detail was still evident as were the colours. under the 40 degree heat of the sun.

There is currently some human intervention i.e. archaeologists, students and volunteers to continue digging and restoration work which will be undertaken for many years.

Honey, let's find some more shade here ??

There is also a cultural and historic centre nearly completed which will bring in more tourists so for the Moroccans it is important to preserve this now. It will also change the whole aspect in that it may stop people getting up close and personal to the ruins by cordoning off areas with fences, ropes and barriers much like other ruins we’ve visited.

If ever you visit Morocco, Volubilis is a 'must see'. More information can be found on this Wikilink - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volubilis

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FEZ

Population in the Medina: Our estimation - 700,000
One of the Imperial Cities and the Cultural and Spiritual capital of Morocco

Just like the 3 lettered name of the city all we can say is …..OMG !!! A real culture shock, another Imperial City of Morocco and the world’s oldest and largest inhabited Medieval walled city is Fez. Our local guide was born and brought up in the Medina and he knew his way around it like the back of his hand and at times we had to almost sprint to keep up with him. Inside the walls, Fez contains 44,000 dead-ends and 9,000 thoroughfares in a small area of land within the “Old city”, and markets are central to their activity.

Fez Medina is also the world’s largest CAR-free area !! Only hard working donkeys, hand pulled carts and motor scooters are allowed in here. Cars, trucks and Petit Taxis park outside the main gates into the Medina and thankfully they do because with the public darting everywhere inside it would just mean total chaos if they were. Actually, on reflection it is CHAOS already.

In the Medina, Fez

Busy Market in Fez

We learnt a lesson here about Petit Taxis. These little vehicles have a fixed price for a journey, and even come in different colours in different cities. For example the colour in Meknes may be yellow, in Fez they could be red and so on. In Casablanca they could come in any colour as long as you pay the price the driver asks. Simple ! Just to confuse the issue there are also Grande Taxis, usually Mercedes Benz, when those hard working donkeys or Petit Taxis weren't available. We also learnt something just as important, and sure you are asking the question.... "Did you have to cover your head during the tour of Morocco?" No, but it is advised the stick to a conservative dress code and western style of clothing is accepted. No 'boob tubes, hot pants or minis, pleeeease !!

It was explained to us that Morocco is more 'liberal' in its thinking about women's rights and the wearing of headdress (burka) in today's Morocco is only carried out by hard line traditional Islamists, or jealous husbands who maintain their wives cover themselves in public. But today, the 'new' thinking is mainly due to a young King Mohommed VI, the current King, but also due in part to his wife (only 1), Salma Bennani, a Computer Engineer who worked for a company owned by the Royal Family. Princess Salma is the first wife of a serving King to have a public profile and often photographed with their 2 children. This was unheard of in the past.

Like our Guide, the Royal Princess was born in Fez and to describe it as a maze would be putting it simplistically!! Actually if there is a description for something more than a maze, this place is IT.

With our guide we were taken to the different craft making areas, again much like the Medina in Meknes - the metal working, the meat (why does that one stand out – is it the smell or gross displays of produce eg. Goat brains, awful Offal, hooves and tails, but probably worst/best of all was the camel head – eyes, tongue and those protruding teeth they have ?). Thankfully our Group of 8 had stomachs for such things. Even Mike who we found out was vegetarian.

Might be timely to mention here that at this stage, only a couple of days into the trip that the ‘Upset Tummys’ were starting to take each of us down. We were trying to work out what had caused it – was it the food - soups made by the side of the road, the Tagines, the water (and we were drinking bottled water only), the heat, the bottled Coco Cola or a combination of all of the above. In fact, on this trip we made another Best Friend – Immodium !!!

Coco Cola OR ALOC OCOC as it
is written in Arabic (backwards)

Now back to Fez…. It was named as a UNESCO Heritage site in 1981 and our Guide gave us some pointers as to which laneways were dead-ends and which were thoroughfares, all 44,000 and 9,000 respectively. So after our group had been walking around for about an hour in the Medina, dazed, confused and disorientated from heat exhaustion and the crowds and smells, he turns to ME (ME… !!! – have I got something written on my forehead) and asks "Do you think this is a Dead-End or a Thoroughfare?" To which I replied – a Dead-End. His reply – OK off you go. It would have been an insult if I didn’t, so I bit the bullet and guess what – I was right, it was a Dead-End ! My theory was because unlike the main streets, the dead-ends have less people and few donkeys.

Our guide knew that close by was a main thoroughfare, which I had walked passed. Thank God! Imagine, lost in FEZ. Even Google Earth doesn’t show the true extent of how many laneways/streets/walkways there are in this Imperial city because many are covered or dug out (or caved in) into what seemed like underground channels and so close together. I also had a fear that he might just ask our Group of 8 to navigate our way back to the Hotel Fez Inn where we were staying in this huge city, the second largest in Morocco with an overall population of close to 2 million. We'd rather find our way into one of those little Riads (home) and sleep on a rug on a floor rather than find our way out of this one !!!

And just going back to the topic of donkeys, it was interesting to find out that 'Fezzers' ie. people of Fez (not their real name), shoe their donkeys with rubber boots so that they don't scare people as they carry goods through the markets. Instead, their masters call out رحلt رحل (move, move) as they move through the crowd, or get stomped on. It is also thought that putting rubber shoes on the donkeys reduces their noise and stops them from slipping over on the cobblestones which are wet down to keep dust levels to a minimum.

Being curious, at one stage I popped my head into an open doorway. It was actually someone’s home or Riad. It was made up of packed earth and crude earth bricks, and all that was contained within were rugs and mattresses on the floor, cushions propped up against the walls, a little 1-burner gas stove and a little table and small cupboard. There was No TV that I could see, no bookshelves or other furniture that would be basic for us. In having said that, we went to a site which overlooked the Old and New City of Fez and the thing that stood out the most on the rooftops were satellite dishes, thousands of them.

Satellite Dishes in Fez

Writings about Fez explain that it is a living monument and instumental way back i.e. 12th to 15th centuries in arts, architecture and town development in Northern Africa and this was still quite evident. And is still regarded as an important imperial city and to this day and contains the Royal Palace, the Army headquarters and the fortifications of early times along with the maze of laneways and crudely built houses which are protected under the UNESCO Development plans and Framework. We aren't totally sure on this point but we thought that the Framework may have meant the walls being held with timber or scaffolding.

The UNESCO Framework (overhead)

There is no denying that the "Old City" is deteriorating and over populated, and under UNESCO has been determined as a non-construction zone. Of course, this means "Urban Sprawl" and Fez is no different from any other place on this earth. In fact, our hotel, the Fez Inn is located in the "New City", the new part which is called the Ville Nouvelle, but is adorned in the tradional Moroccan Mosaics, all of which are hand cut and made of natural colours from the earth, minerals and rocks. We were to see this craftsmanship first hand when we visited a Ceramics and Pottery workshop to see how they were produced.

Moroccan Tagines and Pottery

This is when Ari had some fun because she put her hand up to "spin" some pottery. We weren't sure if she was excited by having actually made container with lid in clay, or she was recalling the scene in "Ghost". Remember, Ari and Brian were on their honeymoon. Just look at her expression in the photo.

Another highlight, not necessarily for the smell, was a visit to the centuries old Tannery in the centre of Fez. Here they still use the same methods of skinning, dying and drying skins of various species of animals as were used in times past. To prepare us for the smell we were given large spigs of Mint to beathe in. The smell was so bad that it screwed our faces while the workers were smiling as if they were working in a perfumery. Just awful!!!

Even though we were gasping for some fresh air, which there wasn't any within a 1.5 kms radius of the Tannery, we could breathe enough to take a photo of the process. There were men almost swimming, well up to there knees at least, in these Dye Pits of different colours.

I found a You Tube clip with a really good video of the process. Note: the top of Photo 2 - the white (acid) pits - it is where the fur, fat and meat is separated from the hide. Not sure where Mike was at this point, actually not sure if he was even there. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qnz1j_hYcvM

Tannery Photo 2

Tannery Photo 1

We also visited another Mosque in the heart of Fez and now that Tony knew what to look for he again, made his way around the mosaic walls with their beautiful inscriptions and held his hand over just about every letter there. Again! And by this stage Moroccans were starting to mistake him for a Moroccan.....here we go again. Secretly I think he was enjoying the attention because he seemed to have this knack of getting their attention too, the only difference they were wearing their Djellabas, the traditional Arabic men's dress.

The following day for us in Fez would be a free day - if we wanted to go back into the Medina and the old city for some more market shopping. Far out!!…Did we want to tackle all those dead-end streets and laneways again, this time without a guide to show us around? You betcha we did, because this was probably the only opportunity we’d have to ever do it again.

Only 4 of us decided to go. It is at this point where Rachel, Brian and Ari really came out on their own when it came to bargaining – all in different way. For example, Rachel had read up in the “Lonely Planet” that when you show interest in buying an item and ask for a price, you should always go about a third lower, then keep bargaining up or down until everyone is happy with the price. And there were some great bargains to be had – shoes, jewellery, berber carpets, scarves, handbags and just about anything else you fancy. If they didn’t have the item/size/colour, they knew another market stall holder who would. Usually they would say it was their brother, their uncle’s brother in law, their cousin’s cousin, their mother’s neighbour’s father who would – and at the “GOOD” price, or BEST PRICE, of course. We were almost ready to hear “their donkey” who also had a great bargain”. Brian had a different style, he would just bargain DOWN, DOWN, DOWN. At one point he even had a guy following him all the way up this laneway, continuing to reduce his price, and Brian still didn’t budge. But apparently another tactic they use is to ask you a series of questions, such as – Where are you from?.. Do you like Morocco? …What would you like to buy?... Would you like to come to my shop? Usually when you have answered the first question ie…Where are you from? They assess your level of wealth according to country and base a price on that. Good economy – high price and so on. They do their homework. Some will even say they have been to your country….Yeah right !!!

But to put it mildly we were harassed by touts to a point where it wasn’t fun anymore, and it came to a point where this one guy kept following us, asking questions and wouldn’t relent. And because of all the little laneways it was a little hard to get away from them and this is where I got frustrated, turned around and said, “Yes, we are enjoying Morocco, but please Sir, leave us alone because we do not want YOU to make this an unpleasant experience for us.” He left us alone. We saw him later harassing some more folks in the same way.

Thankfully Yacine was at the agreed meeting point at the time he promised later that afternoon. علي الله

God Willing.

Just window shopping AGAIN
How many pairs of shoes have
you bought now Ari?????

The honeymooners were in shopping heaven and I forget how many pairs of shoes Ari bought, but she was in here element, as was Brian. FEZ OMG it was an experience hopefully never to be repeated unless you are armed with the right answers, know what you want to buy and most of all - have a large emply suitcase with you for all those souvenirs.

The adventure continues. Till the next episode.

Liz and Tony.