The Hashish Paved Road to Fes
Waving a fond farewell to Chefchauen, we set off, on Andrew’s choice of ‘the scenic route’ (of course!) towards Fes which was to take us via the Rif Valley. What none of us knew however, was that the scenic route was described in our Rough Guide (read later that evening) as a route ‘not to be undertaken by inexperienced drivers’. The road was windy, busy and arduously slow going. But at least the views made up for it.
The Rif Valley also hides a slightly more secretive past-time as the hashish producing region of Morocco. We were constantly flashed by passing cars, while the occupants of the cars gesticulated wildly indicating a smoking sign as they drove past.
At one stage, a black Mercedes Benz with tinted windows and a motley crew within became particularly attentive, driving up our cars’ tails, passing in front of us, then slowing down whilst flashing and hooting and waving and shouting at us to slow down and pull-over. After about 10 kms they finally realized that we were dudds as potential buyers and left us alone.
W pulled into an outer-lying campsite, ”Camping Inernational” in the dark that evening. After a hearty tagine, we stumbled off to our tents.
The next morning, we were awoken by the calls to mosque – exotic an evocative in the still morning. Mohammed, the campsite manager, had organised us a guided tour for the group, as the Medina of Fes can be confusing and almost impossible to negotiate as a non-resident. Hamid, our tour guide and salesman extraordinaire, kick-started his tour with a bird’s eye-view of the old Medina (old town). He explained that in the Medina, life carries on as if the modern world has never existed. He lead us through alleyways, introducing us to the family roles traditionally played for hundreds of years. The father and sons learn a family trade (such as pottery, wood carving, weaving etc) and the mother is then responsible for buying wool from the year’s trade. The wool is the family’s ‘insurance’ and is used to make traditional carpets.
Although parts of the Medina are certainly frozen in time, such as the food markets and donkey transport trotting purposefully through the alleyways, the modern world has managed to creep in, visible as satellite dishes in the hundreds sunning themselves on the Medina roofs and “made in China” trinkets for sale.
Hamid then lead us to a ‘pharmacist’ also known as a glorified spice merchant who managed to sell us spices and musk smelling soap for outrageous prices. Hamid no doubt was chuffed, as he was getting a commission on all our purchases. As Andrew commented later, being with Hamid was like watching a great 30 minute documentary followed by hours of advertisements. The culmination of Hamid’s show occurred when he took us to the ‘UNESCO approved Government Co-op Carpet Sales House’. Here, in an exquisite and restored house inside the Medina, we were separated into couples and herded into separate rooms where we were shown carpet after carpet by relentless salesmen. Some of the carpets were beautiful and Chippy and Richard, Mikaela’s parents, made Hamid’s day by purchasing not one, but two! Chippy, slightly ashen-faced, remarked that she was not even sure the carpets would match their furniture! But such was the charm Hamid had managed to pour over us, to his credit.
One of our last stops on the way out was the famous tannery. Seen and smelt from above, it truly looks like a giant’s paint-box as Michael Palin so eloquently describes in his Saharan documentaries.
It was late afternoon by the time we exited the Medina’s walls into the bright sunshine and breathed in some fresher air. After stocking up on grocery supplies from a swanky supermarket, we headed back to our campsite. The next morning was spent chasing up third party insurance, which we hadn’t managed to get at the border. Paula also spent some time contacting the SA embassy in London in order to follow up on her renewed SA passport. We finally left town around mid-afternoon and spent a freezing night camping near Azrou.
