Fes: Morocco’s Spiritual Capital
By Judy Murray,
Nothing beats the slap of hot air that hits your face when you first step out the door of an airplane, writes Judy Murray.
The bright blue glare of the flowering Jacaranda trees, the profusion of donkeys and mules dodging the traffic on the short drive from airport to hotel, continued to build my excitement, and later that night when I sat on the hotel terrace sipping a cold glass of something, with crescent moon and glittering stars above my head, the last cry of the muezzin to prayer confirmed that yes indeed (as a Kerry friend would say) I was definitely out foreign.
I was not in Fez, which is a type of headgear originating in Turkey (and, for those of us old enough to remember, worn by Tommy Cooper) but in Fes, the spiritual capital of Morocco. Created at the crossroads of two caravan routes, from the Atlantic in the west, and the Mediterranean in the North, it was, and still is, an artistic and cultural city, with an abundance of music, good food , historic buildings and one of the oldest Medinas in the Arab world.
This was to be my base from which to explore Volubilis, the most important Roman site in Morocco, and the nearby pilgrimage town of Moulay Idriss, named after a descendent of the Prophet, responsible for bringing Islam to Morocco. And, if this was not enough to keep me on my toes, I was also there to attend the annual Fes Festival of Sacred Music.
We entered the Fes el Bali (the old walled city) through the 12th century… See more…