I was hoping to deal Montazuma a fatal blow today by not eating any dairy products because he had executed a deadly early morning raid and had gained some ground.

Dry muesli was a bit of a spitting feathers affair, but with plenty of water, it went down, eventually. I had quite a lot of things planned today, so after loading Betty up we were ready for the off. I then noticed the chain had gone a bit saggy and the reason for this being my automatic chain oiler had been ripped off in the past few days. I don't know how that had happened because I'd hardly been taking it off road.

I manually drooped a bit of oil on the chain and took off into the Cedar forests to the south of the town, the road rose quickly and the air became cool. Taking the tourist route through the forest was very unlike anything I had seen in Morocco. I could have been in Scotland had the road not been in such bad condition.

After 15km I turned around and came back, coming around a corner, there was a large stone in the road that hadn't been there before, and then I realised it was another tortoise. I had to stop and have a look and also get the little fellow off the road!

Ma ma

A few kms further on there were a load of apes in the road. They went doo lally at the motorcycle, so I stopped a way down the road and approached the group. At first they were a bit nervous, keeping mainly to the trees, but after a while they came down and started to do normal Barbary Ape things like grooming and ragging each other up.

First steps

A few couples had very small young and I was amazed to see how intimate both the parents were with the baby and with each other. There was no one else about and I felt very fortunate to see these endangered animals living naturally.

You were guaranteed a sight of them at the car park on the main road but these poor fellows had been constantly fed human food so were quite high on e-numbers and didn't act very naturally. I had been told some of them were addicted to fags which is a bit of a tragedy.

On from the cedar trees and towards Bhalil, I joined a fast moving national road. Things were getting more and more European. The cars became newer, the houses more European looking and there seemed to be much more of the upper class about.

I wanted to visit Bhalil because there were a lot of cave houses here that were still lived in. Unfortunately, as I turned into the village, I was confronted by a wall of mayhem indicating just one fearful event. Market Day! I really didn't want to try entering into the affray, so I turned around and sat down at a roadside cafe to plan my next move.

There was just one big scary journey to be done. I needed to get into Fez and park somewhere close to the Medina where my planned hotel was. I managed to find the right area on the sat nav and it calculated me a route. This is where I would really have to rely on this technological terror because there was no time for making decisions about which way to turn at the next junction. It was all about staying on two wheels and out of trouble.

The route into town was generally very easy, for just 4 km, did the traffic become very 'organic', the best way to describe it was if the city was hand milking a cow. Only once was I directed down a one way street and the diversion was quickly re-worked out. Very soon, I was at my intended destination with no moments or panics. Sat Nav had done its job admirably.

I got a room at my intended hotel, but there was no en suite toilet or shower. I would have to keep my clothes to hand just in case I had to dash across the corridor if Montazuma got all mean again. Putting on some cooler clothes, I drew a deep breath and dived into the largest Medina in the world which was quite a sensory shock. It was mad, yet ordered, chaotic, but the wheels kept turning, it was something I have never experienced.

The main street in Fez

The main streets were 3-4 metres wide with some side streets less than a metre wide. A map was of little use, everything was on top of you. I decided to head down one street and back up the main street, just to get my bearings. Stalls spilled out onto the street selling an unending array of goods. Most shops looked little patronised. Most shop keepers looked a bit bored and invited any one passing, usually tourists, into their emporiums. Perhaps it was a quiet time of year, but I think there was a supply and demand problem here. The main street alone must have had 20 shops selling rugs. How many rugs can you sell to locals or tourists with a 20kg baggage allowance?

To be fair I had bought a moderately sized rug in Sarajevo and transported it most of the way across Europe on the back of my bike, but I was young and silly then.

I stopped for some food at a cafe obviously intended for tourists and was subjected to lots of additional extras being offered which had to be knocked back. It was lunchtime, I didn't want a 5 course meal! It was a good place to watch the world going by though. Plenty of traders coming and going, hand drawn carts full of vegetables, mules laden with gas bottles. It was all going on.

I went back to the hotel after buying some presents for home. I knew I had not got the best price, even though I had haggled, but, in the end, compared to home it was good value, locally made goods.

I went out for my evening meal and ended up at a much more relaxed cafe/restaurant. There was lots of welcomes and I had a great seat to see the front of house chao trying to gain custom, he was very pleasant, all smiles and great language skills, but he has a very low success rate.

Some tourists seemed just rude or totally out of their depth, stomping about with stoney expressions on their face and waving away anyone who approached them. I found that I had to answer everyone who greeted me, because sometimes that was all they were doing and if they offered me anything I didn't want with a polite, la shukkran, was a pleasant and easy way to deal with unwanted sales.

These people were doing their trade, they needed to feed their families and it was how business is done round here. I explained to the chap at the front that I thought he was doing the right thing but Westerners were used to choosing for themselves and were generally worried by people approaching them.

I took another walk around after dinner and was approached by a number of people offering to take me to a Hammam or a cafe, but it wasn't a problem to say no thank you and even shake a few hands. We all need to do something to put dinner on the table.

A side street in the Medina

I ended up in a cafe talking to an Egyptian journalist and his student friend in pieces of 5 different languages the subjects being from religion, language and the price of a packet of fags. They were happily bubbling away on a bong which seems quite acceptable to do.

After they had gone the cafe closed and the staff got the beer out! I was invited to stay with them as I was obviously entertainment. After a couple of very small beers it was suggested that I go with them all to a nightclub to dance the night away. I could see trouble coming my way like a freight train and managed to fain terrible tiredness and got back to my hotel.

Even at 11pm at night the medina felt safe, kids would kick balls about, people went about their business, builders carted loads around in noisy mini dumper trucks. This was a place like no other. What a night!