Fes

Fes
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Overview

Fès (also spelled Fez and in Arabic, Fas) is the third largest city in Morocco, after Casablanca and Rabat. It lies in a valley bordered by the foothills of the Atlas Mountains, and on the old crossroads of caravan routes connecting the Saharan empires like Timbuktu with the Atlantic and the Mediterranean shipping lanes.

The most ancient and impressive of the imperial cities (Fès, Marrakech, Meknes and Rabat are known as the Imperial Cities, each having been the country’s capital at some time during its history), it is still considered the cultural and spiritual centre of Morocco, the holiest city in the Islamic world after Mecca and Medina .

Fes is three distinct parts: Fes el-Bali (Old Fes), Fes el-Jdid (New Fes), and the modern, French-built Ville Nouvelle.

Fes el-Bali is the best preserved, continuously inhabited, medieval city still in existence. So precious are Fes’s history, architecture, and culture, that it has been declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Its medina is an unmappable maze of more than 9,000 alleys where mules are the only form of transport and life is a fascinating blend of medieval and modern. A far reaching conservation campaign has been attempting to preserve and interpret the remarkable historic legacy, with new uses being sought for fabulous old palaces, many of which are being restored by both Moroccan and foreign families.

Fes el-Jdid, south of the medina, is a 13th-century ‘new’ town, home to the Dar el-Makhzen or Royal Palace (restored but closed to the public) and Mellah, the former Jewish quarter. The Ville Nouvelle is the city’s modern business and commercial centre with wide boulevards, hotels, restaurants, cafés, bookshops, the university, the railway station and main bus terminus.

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Guide

Public Transport

Local buses, which tend to be crowded but run regularly, connect the Ville Nouvelle with various parts of the old city. Route numbers are marked on the side of the buses. Some useful ones include bus 9 (place Atlas in Ville nouvelle to near the Dar Batha Museum); bus 12 (BabBoujeloud to Bab Ftouh, the Medina’s southeast gate, Fes el-Bali); bus 19 (railway station to Place er-Rsif, central Fes el-Bali).

The only practical way of getting around the medina is on foot. (You can get taxis from all the gates of the Medina.)

Taxis

There are two types of taxis: the small, red petits taxis operate within the city limits, tend to be metered and are inexpensive, only carrying three passengers.

Grands taxis are bigger and travel fixed routes from Fes to outlying areas mostly from the main bus station (gare routière). Both types of taxis are often shared and drivers may wait until the taxi is full before departing. You can ask to have a petit taxi to yourself.

Car Hire

Fes has many car rental companies, including Avis (tel: 055 626 969; website: www.avis.ma), Budget (tel: 055 940 092; website: www.budget.com), Europcar (tel: 055 626 545; website: www.europcar.ma) and Hertz (tel: 055 622 812; website: www.hertz.com).

Bicycle Hire

Bicycle hire is not available in Fes. Fes el-Bali is a pedestrian and donkey/mule only zone, and therefore unsuitable for cycles.

Introduction

Cultural offerings in Fes abound: ask for details at the tourist office, where you can also usually buy tickets. Lectures, exhibitions and films sometimes take place at the Institut Francais, 33 rue Loukili (tel: 055 623 921; website: www.institutfrancaisfes.com). Local music can mostly be heard in the hotels and sometimes in the streets, especially during festivals and after breaking the Ramadan fast.

The most prominent annual festival in Morocco, the Festival of World Sacred Music (website: www.fesfestival.com), takes place in Fes around the end of May - early June and lasts for about 10 days. It brings in visitors and performers from all over the world to share spiritual music from their cultures. Sacred music doesn’t mean that the music performed is necessarily religious; rather that the music will lift viewers’ spirits as musicians display a variety of styles, from European classical to Sufi music, African classical guitar to Japanese drumming and American gospel. A variety of venues are used and some concerts are free. Accommodation during the festival is hard to come by, so arrangements need to be made as far in advance as possible.

A few cinemas in the Ville Nouvelle show foreign films, mainly dubbed into French as does the Cinema Boujeloud (inside Bab Boujeloud) in Fes el-Bali.