🇲🇦

Fez

Morocco

📷 Jgcachafeiro — Pexels

Route info

Timezone

GMT+1

CurrencyDH MAD

LanguageArabic / French

Airport transfer~30 minTaxi / Bus (line 16) / Private transfer

About Fez

Fez is the oldest and most preserved medieval city in the world — the Fes el-Bali medina is a living labyrinth of 9000 alleyways, 14th-century madrasas, dye pits, and brass workshops that has barely changed in 600 years. It's louder, more disorienting, and more real than Marrakech, without the relentless tourist pressure, and the food — pastilla, mechoui, couscous with seven vegetables — reflects a centuries-old culinary tradition that influenced cuisine from Andalusia to Senegal. Come for the sensory overload, stay for the extraordinary craft culture and the quietest riads you'll find in Morocco.

Visa requirements

Visa Free

Visa requirements depend on your passport — check your government's travel advice before booking.

Good to know

✓Hire a licensed guide for the first day — the medina is genuinely disorienting and unmarked
✓Visit the Chouara tannery in the morning when the dyes are freshest and the smell is less brutal
✓Stay in a riad inside the medina, not the modern Ville Nouvelle, for the full atmosphere

Popular airlines on this route

Royal Air Maroc

Ryanair

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✈️ Getting there

FEZFès–Saïss Airport

📍 15 km⏱ 30 min🚕 Taxi🚌 Bus (line 16)🚌 Private transfer

City bus line 16 runs from the airport to the Fez el-Jdid area near the medina for around 4 MAD (€0.35) but runs infrequently — a petit taxi to the medina should cost 60–100 MAD (€5–9) and takes 20–30 minutes; agree the price before getting in as meters are rarely used.

A small regional airport served primarily by Ryanair, easyJet, and Transavia from European cities — compact and easy to navigate but with limited facilities airside; Fez is often the best-value entry point for northern Morocco.

Don't Miss

Hidden gems and local experiences in Fez — beyond the tourist trail.

🎨Reach the Chouara Tanneries terrace by 9–10am when the dye pots are freshest and the light is best — the terrace is accessed through the leather shops above (free if you're with a guide, shops give you mint to hold against the smell). The circular dye pots seen from above, filled with saffron yellow, poppy red, and cobalt blue, are genuinely one of the great visual spectacles of North Africa.

📚Visit the Bou Inania Madrasa early morning (8–9am) before tour groups arrive — this 14th-century Quranic school has the finest zellige tilework, carved cedarwood, and stucco decoration in Morocco. It's still a working religious school so dress respectfully; entry is around 20 MAD.

🍋Eat lunch at a local restaurant inside the medina rather than at tourist-facing places on the main drag — R'hamna Restaurant near Rcif Square is cheap, has no English menu, and serves market-fresh harira soup and lamb tagine to medina workers. A full lunch with bread costs under 50 MAD.

🕌Walk to the Marinid Tombs on the hilltop above the medina just before sunset — the ruins themselves are unremarkable but the panoramic view over the entire Fes el-Bali from above is extraordinary, especially in the warm late light when the green-tiled mosque rooftops glow. It's completely free and rarely crowded.

🪔Hire a local guide for one half-day in the medina — a certified guide from the official tourism office costs around 150–250 MAD for 3 hours and will take you through the carpentry souks, the copper quarter, and the textile dyers who don't appear on any map. The medina has 9000 streets and getting genuinely lost is not a metaphor; a guide is the difference between frustrating and unforgettable.