Marrakech – jewel of the South
Click here for a map of Marrakech
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Marrakech is a city which makes an intoxicating assault on all the senses. The ancient medina, behind its twelfth-century walls, abuts the ‘Nouvelle Ville’ of the nineteenth century. Mule carts weave between modern cars, satellite dishes rise above the roofs of the oldest houses and fashionable restaurants and shops are hidden near souks where trades and crafts have continued unchanged for hundreds of years. Marrakech is a place of primary colours: cobalt tiles, green-glazed roofs, and red and saffron yellow rugs. The smell of Marrakech is distinctive: wood-smoke, spices and aromatic resin, with occasional bursts of sweet-smelling steam from a hammam or honeysuckle from a hidden garden behind a high wall. The rhythm of the city is heard in an echo of tam-tam drums and in the call to prayer from the minarets, but also in the silence of seemingly forgotten lanes, or peaceful roof terraces above the bustle of the souks. The place all this comes together is in the Jemma el-Fna, a wide, open space that is the heart of Marrakech. Centuries old, it is a place of the city and its inhabitants, rather than just a sight for visitors. By evening it is at its most magical: there are story-tellers and snake charmers with hooded cobras, men with hawks or monkeys on their arms, water sellers with their gourds, pipe-players, dancers and fortune tellers. Marrakech is also rich in culture and abounds in places of interest that are a testimony to the country’s long history. The Saadian Tombs, an ornate sixteenth-century mausoleum, are one of the finest examples of Islamic architecture in Morocco. By contrast, the lush peace of the Majorelle Gardens evolved as an artist’s retreat in the Nouvelle Ville in the 1920s. Here cacti, vines and tropical flowers tumble around waterways, mosaics and high walls painted in almost unimaginably vibrant greens and bright blues. But Marrakech has many other delights, some just a view glimpsed through a doorway. There are surviving fondouks; the galleried ancient caravanserai; the distinctive Jewish quarter; the ramparts changing from ochre to rust in the changing light and storks nesting between the castellations; ornate city gates and minarets. Anything seems possible in this unique and timeless city. Highlights
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