Morocco, located in North Africa, is a very densely populated country with around 32 million inhabitants.
Morocco is a popular destination for holiday makers because of its warm weather, historical architecture and bustling market places. Anyone visiting the city of Marrakech will enjoy shopping in the markets, where haggling is not only allowed, it’s expected. A holiday in Morocco isn’t complete without a tour to the markets.
You should also be prepared for the weather in Morocco as it can get very hot and the country is prone to the occasional drought, which is far removed from the weather here in the UK.
When staying in Morocco, you have a choice of different types of properties, but you should always try to stay in one of the many riads. Riads are traditional Moroccan buildings that feature indoor gardens, often with waterfalls.
Communication in Morocco shouldn’t be too much of a problem for the experienced traveller as French is one of the most spoken languages in the country. A strong grasp of the French language will come in handy when you’re haggling in those markets!
Travel to Morocco is never complete without sampling the local cuisine. Moroccan cuisine is very distinctive, with many spices used in all of their food.
Essaouira’s hypnotic Gnaoua and World Music Festival takes place from 25-28 June this year. Celebrating Gnaoua heritage, the music has influences as widespread as Haitian voodoo and Brazilian Candomblé. As trance music permeates the picturesque port, its purple ramparts and whitewashed medina, Essaouira’s bustling streets slow down, and become eerie and evocative. Held across ten medina stages, the free festival is a meeting point for foreign artists and a melting-pot of worldwide rhythms. Stay at the Heure Bleue, a Relais et Chateaux riad, and you can snooze to the beat of distant drums from its rooftop pool. A four-night stay costs from £1,190 pp (two sharing) during the festival, including flights (Gatwick), private transfers and B&B. Call The Best of Morocco on 0845 026 4588.
Holidaymakers are fleeing the Euro-zone for better deals to destinations like Morocco. But before you travel to another continent, it’s best that you go prepared and familarise yourself with the local customs. Here we’ve compiled a Top 10 list courtesy of Moroccan travel experts, The Best of Morocco, to help you ease into the Moroccan way of life.
1. Tipping
Tipping is part of everyday life in Morocco. You may think it’s only done by tourists, but it’s not! The locals do it to show their appreciation for good service. In Morocco, you tip just about everyone, the drivers, concierge, waiters, and the list goes on. Even when you dine in restaurants with a 12% gratuity and service charge to your bill, a tip is still expected.
2. Ramadan
Like any other Muslim country, during the Islamic month of fasting, participating Muslims does not eat or drink from dawn until sunset. Ramadan hardly affects tourists in major cities, there is only a slight change to shop opening hours. Food and drink is still available throughout daylight hours in hotel and tourist restaurants. However, as a matter of respect, you should not walk in the streets eating or drinking and if you are in a shop, you should try not to smoke.
3. No Lefties
On the dinner table that is. To experience a true Moroccan meal, you should try eating with your hands. But like other Muslim countries, you should always eat with the right hand, as the left is supposed to be used for the toilet.
4. Bargaining Power
When shopping in markets, the price you’re told is almost never the final price as sellers expect you to bargain. It is wise to bargain from half of the offer price, and take it from there. Eventually you’ll meet at a price you’re both happy with.
Here’s an example of “Haggling in Action”, a video of tourists buying shoes at a market in Marrakech.
5. Photo Opp
When taking photos of locals, it’s best to ask for permission first. Moroccans are generous and passionate people, but that’s not necessarily the case when strangers go snapping away with their cameras. In tourist places you may be required to tip them for a good pose at the camera.
6. Dress Code
There aren’t really any restrictions for women to dress in shorts or tank tops during the summer, as the locals are pretty used to it with many tourists visiting Morocco each year. However, when you enter a mosque, or any other holy place, you should dress conservatively out of respect, meaning cover your shoulders and pants over your knees. The same applies for male travellers also.
7. Got the Stomach for It?
Morocco is considered to be one of the few places in Africa that has the safest and cleanest drinking water distribution, but it is not advised for travellers to drink from the tap. Water in Morocco contains higher levels of minerals than water in Europe. The locals are used to absorb high-mineralized water, but travellers may fall ill from drinking it. It’s nothing major, just a case of an upset stomach, but that’s enough to spoil a holiday!
8. Shoes off
When invited to someone’s home for an authentic Moroccan meal, remember to leave your shoes by the door. As a custom, Moroccans do not wear outside shoes in their homes, or on their fabulous rugs.
9. Meet and Greet
Greetings are important in Morocco, as they often shake hands, right hand of course, and ask how each other and their family are doing. A cursory greeting is considered rude and offensive.
10. Eat Like a Pig
Nothing displays true Moroccan hospitality better than a good meal. When invited to a meal, prepare to be stunned by the variety and portion of the meals served. Be prepared to feast on couscous and kebabs whilst in Morocco. For pork lovers, it is difficult, though not impossible, to obtain pork dishes in restaurants, so beef, lamb and seafood are often the only available alternatives.
When every riad, relais or resort hotel looks sumptuous, every unusual spa treatment sounds heavenly, every maison d’hôtes feels more alluring than the last, every pool’s seductive, every restaurant’s romantic, how do you ever make a decision? Trawling through TripAdvisor, and being besieged by poxy pop-ups and countless crappy banner ads, is one way. But who really cares what Gloria from Gushville, Tennessee, thought of the place anyway, or indeed that the colour of the suite’s loo paper didn’t meet her curious tastes? And why does she use capital letters ALL THE TIME and sooooo many exclamation marks??!!!!!!!
The Value of Vox Populi
To help more easily sort the wheat from the, well, wheat, The Best of Morocco have introduced ‘Top Five’ guides, where the lists are compiled based on client feedback, and updated weekly. The list includes Top Five riads, hotels, destinations, pools, restaurants and things that are currently proving most popular with the independent travellers.
“Now you don’t have to just take our word on Morocco – you can see what our customers say, too. In this age of endless information and hollow homages, such a reliable helping hand in shortlisting your options is very welcome.”, explained by Steve Diederich, the Managing Director of The Best of Morocco.
The Best of Morocco, offers the most comprehensive Morocco programme you will find in the country. Tailor-made packages offers great flexibility and is designed to work to your budget. The array of activities includes camel treks, walking treks, Land Rover safaris, skiing, surfing, horse-riding, golf, birdwatching, quad-biking and cooking.
For further information or to find out which riad’s currently top of the accommodation pops, visit The Best of Morocco website.
The video for U2’s latest single, Magnificent, sees the band recording and wandering around ancient Fez, Morocco’s most charismatic, colourful and temporally untampered town. There’s footage of the riad-turned studio where U2, together with legendary producers Brian Eno and Daniel Lanois, wrote and recorded much of their new album, No Line on the Horizon, and then scenes of Bono, The Edge, Adam and Larry strolling the labyrinthine medina of Fez-el-Bali, a still-unmapped, scented underworld of 10,000 alleys and small markets in various quarters where donkeys wobble by with toppling loads, children run through your legs and healers sell cures for everything from haemorrhoids to a broken heart.
This isn’t the first time the supergroup have set up camp in the Imperial City – the video for 1992’s Mysterious Ways was set there. Fez’ magical lure evidently remains just as strong: one song on their latest album is called Fez – Being Born. Said Bono about this latest stay: “We’d record during the day and then disappear into windy streets of the medina at night. It was an inspiring experience”.
If the video tempts you to visit Fez, make sure you travel with specialists The Best of Morocco. Confirmed U2 fans, the company’s staff are also Fez experts, able to recommend the best guides (you’ll need one to navigate the maze), the best leather shops in the tanneries, the best medersas (beautiful university buildings) to pause in, the best restaurants and hookah coffee houses to slumber in, and the best times for excursions to Meknes, which U2’s video briefly visits, and to the Roman remains at Volubilis.
They can also suggest the best accommodation, such as the Dar Anebar: a traditional riad much like the one featured in U2’s video, only without the huge amps, Irish musicians and piled-up carpets. Set around a trickling fountain and ornate courtyard, this homely riad boasts a roof terrace, unintrusive service, fine food, and numerous nooks and crannies.
The start of U2’s stay in Fez purposefully coincided with the Festival of Sacred Music, with the band hoping to be inspired by the spiritual music on show from around the globe. They later claimed the plan had worked. For those interested in similar musical genesis, the Festival is this year held between 29 May and 6 June.
A four-night stay in Fez at the Dar Anebar costs £610 pp in June, including flights (Gatwick), private transfers and B&B. During the Festival, the same package costs £625 pp. Call The Best of Morocco on 0845 026 4588 (www.realmorocco.com).
Morocco may be a Muslim country, one subject to Islam’s strict prohibition of alcohol consumption, but it’s also open-minded (placing its emphasis on personal choice) and incredibly green. So, in the undulating hills of Meknes in northern Morocco, acre upon acre of vineyards flourish under extremely favourable weather conditions. Producing the equivalent of 35 million bottles last year, local wine ‘appellations’, such as those in France, and Morocco’s first self-styled “Chateau”, are now in existence.
The specialist tour operator, Best of Morocco, can arrange visits to the vineyards to observe production and to sample the wines, using the nearby city of Fes as a base.
A four-night stay in Fes, where the Medina (old city) has barely altered in 200 years, costs from £800 pp staying at Dar Anebar, a sumptuous riad with a rooftop terrace and large suites. (It is not unusual here to find the owner, Ahmed, in a niche, teaching a guest to play the lute, or inviting guests into the kitchen to either join in or watch the preparation of the meals. He has even been known to take a mule up to the nearby city gates to greet newly arriving guests and to carry their bags.) The cost includes return flights from London, accommodation with breakfast, and private transfers. Vineyard visits cost extra.
2009 is the year for a frugal lifestyle, so everyone says, and I’m sure you’ve read story after story about how the weak Pound is affecting value-for-money holidays in the Euro-zone. So, why not travel to Morocco? But wait a minute that’s surely going to cost more, isn’t it…
Well, actually the Pound is still going strong against the Moroccan Dirham. Flights from major UK airports take around 3.5 hours – the same time it can take to travel to Turkey or Greece.
Here are ten things you didn’t know about Morocco, which could inspire you to visit this exciting destination.
1. Watch Shooting Stars
The night of August 12th to 13th is the culminating point of a meteor shower with rates of over one hundred meteors per hour. You can find many luxury hotels in the High Atlas Mountains or the Sahara desert where light pollution won’t spoil visibility. SaharaSky hotel in Zagora has its very own astronomical observatory!
Sahara Sky - Hotel and Astronomical Observatory in Zagora
2. Moroccan Grand Canyon
The Dades Valley of Morocco offers the same peace and tranquility you will find in the Grand Canyon. Stretched between the peaks of the High Atlas Mountains and Jbel Sarhro Mountains, Dades Valley offers a spectacular view of a snowy mountain on one side and a semi-desert on the other.
3. Goats can climb trees in Morocco
In south-west Morocco, you can frequently find goats climbing trees – an unusual photo opportunity! The goats eat the fruit from the argan tree and spit out the pits. The locals collect these pits to extract the bitter kernels inside, which are ground and pressed to make nutty argan oil used in cooking and cosmetics.
4. A hint of Santorini, Greece – in Essaouira
It is easy to mistake Essaouira’s white and blue seafront for Santorini in Greece. Once one of the most prosperous cities in Morocco, it is now home to craftsmen busy making marquetry, traditional Moroccan ornamental furniture from the roots of the thuya tree. Only two hours’ drive from Marrakech, it’s a stunning place for a short break on the Atlantic coast.
Essaouira, Morocco
5. You Can Ski in Morocco
Morocco is probably the only place in the world where you can see snow, desert and sea in one trip. Between January and February you can ski or snowboard in Oukaimeden up in the High Atlas Mountains. If you’re looking for an alternative ski holiday look no further than Morocco.
6. Luxury in the Sahara Desert
What could be more romantic than watching the sun rise over the Sahara desert? This doesn’t have to be a backpacker’s experience! You can travel in comfort from your hotel in Erfoud or Merzouga and spend the night in your own luxury tent in the desert with carpets, beds and hot showers.
Sahara Desert, Morocco
7. Visit UNESCO Heritage Sites
Morocco is an ideal destination for a cultural holiday. Apart from the prevalent Islamic presence, you can find traces of diverse cultures, including Phoenician, Roman, Byzantine and many others. Many of these are UNESCO World Heritage sites, such as the Roman Ruins in Volubilis, one of the best preserved historic sites in Morocco.
8. Surfing All Year Round
With 3,000km of coastline, Morocco is an ideal surfing destination. Surfing classes for adults and children are available all year round. But if you are a seasoned surfer and looking for a challenge then the best time for you is from late autumn to March. There are many unexplored areas to surf south of Agadir and you may find yourself to be the only person out on the waves.
9. “The Gladiator” Was Shot in Morocco
Walk in the footsteps of Angelina, Colin Farrell, Sir Anthony Hopkins and many more Hollywood stars who have filmed in Morocco. Re-live the infamous battle scenes from Russell Crowe’s Gladiator or imagine you’re Omar Sharif in Lawrence of Arabia. You can even take a guided tour of the film studios at Ouarzazate.
10. Step Back in Time in The Blue City
Chefchaouen, a picturesque little town in the Rif Mountains in the north of Morocco, was closed off to the outside world until the 1920s and has remained unspoilt ever since. Breathe in mountain air and stroll through the meandering streets of this charming and friendly town.
Chefchaouen, Morocco
For more information on what to see and do in Morocco, visit The Best of Morocco, the specialist tour operator with over 30 years experience in luxury holidays to Morocco.
