A thousand-year-old walled medina with a square that turns into an open-air kitchen every evening, three hours from Europe and a world away from it.
What it is
Founded in 1070 as the capital of the Almoravid empire, and the base from which Berber dynasties ruled from Spain to Senegal. The medina — the old walled city — is a UNESCO site, about 600 hectares of unmapped alleys behind nineteen kilometres of pisé ramparts, and it is still where a large part of the city actually lives and works.
The colour is real, not a filter: the walls and most buildings are built or rendered in the local red clay, which is why it is called the red city.
Jemaa el-Fnaa
The square at the heart of the medina, and it changes character completely across the day. Mornings: orange juice carts and snake charmers. Afternoon: quiet and hot. After sunset, a hundred food stalls are wheeled in, grills are lit, and the whole square becomes an open-air restaurant with storytellers, Gnaoua musicians and acrobats working the crowd. UNESCO listed the square’s oral traditions as intangible heritage — a first, and it was for the storytellers.
Eat there at least once. Pick a stall that locals are eating at, agree what you are ordering, and be firm about what you did not order arriving anyway.
The souks and haggling
North of the square, the souks run for kilometres, loosely organised by trade — leather, metal, dyers, carpets, spices. Getting lost is the correct experience; you cannot go far wrong because the medina is walled and the square is downhill from most of it.
Haggling is expected and is not adversarial. A rough method that works: decide what the thing is worth to you before you start, open at around a third of the first price, be prepared to walk away sincerely, and stay good-humoured. If you are not enjoying it you are paying too much attention to winning.
“Guides” who attach themselves and lead you to a specific shop are working on commission, which is added to your price. Unofficial guiding is illegal; a firm no is enough.
What else to see
Bahia Palace — nineteenth-century, and the best decorated interiors in the city.
Ben Youssef Madrasa — a fourteenth-century Quranic school with a courtyard of carved cedar, stucco and zellij tilework. Restored and superb.
Le Jardin Majorelle, Yves Saint Laurent’s garden, in a cobalt blue that has its own name, plus the excellent YSL Museum next door. Book ahead; the queue is long.
Saadian Tombs, sealed for two centuries and reopened in 1917.
El Badi Palace — a ruin, and much more atmospheric for it, with storks nesting on the walls.
Practical
Riads — courtyard houses converted to guesthouses — are the accommodation to book, and the good ones are extraordinary value. Your riad will send someone to meet you, because taxis cannot reach most of them and you will not find the door.
Ramadan changes the city substantially; the evening meal in Jemaa el-Fnaa during it is a spectacle.
Dress modestly in the medina — covered shoulders and knees — which is about respect rather than rules.
Friday is the quiet day, with many shops closed around midday prayers.
Out of the city
The High Atlas — Imlil, the Ourika Valley, the Toubkal massif — is an hour away and a different climate. Essaouira on the coast is a windy, relaxed three hours. The Sahara at Merzouga is a long ten hours or an overnight, and the two-night desert trip is the classic add-on.
