Marrakesh Under Maintenance

December 23^rd, 2025 

After a day off, hanging out by the coast, it was time to drive inland to yet another big city, the fourth largest in the country, Marrakesh.  The name Marrakesh (spelled Marrakech by the locals) is derived from the Berber word “Amur” meaning country and “akush” meaning god, so it’s the “land of god or holy land”.

 

Starting inland from the coast.  This was a long straight road, with a speed limit of 60 km/h, which was actually a nice way to soak in the countryside.

Stuck behind some "traffic".

I love the cloud pattern in this photo...and the little sunlit village on the right with its minaret.

Starting to see some mountains.

It must be stupid hot here in the summer.

It was yet another 3-hour drive, which seems to be common for me in this country, I entered the suburbs of Marrakesh.  Unfortunately, the main artery that I took into the city was under construction.  It was a four-lane road, but with no lane markers at times, there was a bit of chaos.  I’ll probably write a blog post about driving in Morocco and one aspect I’ve noticed here as that drivers think that lanes seem to just be “suggestions” at times.  I can’t count the number of vehicles I’ve seen straddling two lanes.

Reaching the outskirts of Marrakech.

After crawling into the centre of town for over twenty minutes, I reached the walled parking lot where I planned to spend the night.  During the day it doubles as a regular parking lot, but many campervans and motorhomes stay overnight for a relatively pricey fee of 150 dirhams ($21 CAD) since there are no services apart from the common Moroccan squat-style toilet.  Reading online reviews about camping there, I was surprised that supposedly it was relatively quiet at night even though it’s in the heart of the city.

 

The parking lot was full, but they let me in and I just sat in Octi for about 20 minutes having lunch until someone came in and left.  After making a bit of a plan with 3-4 landmarks to check out, it was time for a meander in Marrakesh.

Just across the road from the parking lot was the Koutoubia Mosque, with an impressive minaret which is 77 meters tall to place it as the 17th tallest in the world.  It was built in the 1100s. 

First on my list, was Bab Agnaou, one of the best-known gates in Marrakesh which was built around 1190.  It was, and still is, one of the main public entrance points to the kasbah (citadel) in the southern part of Marrakesh’s medina.  It is impressive.

A slightly less impressive gate just inside the kasbah.

A typical street in the kasbah.

Just nearby was my second stop, the Saadian Tombs.  This necropolis dates back to the late 1500s and houses the bodies of numerous royal members of Morocco’s past.  Like the road that I took to enter Marrakesh, the buildings are under some repairs although it seemed to mostly be on the outer parts of the structures.  

Outside of the Saadian Tombs.

Renovations were ongoing in the inner courtyard.

An intricately designed archway.

Tourists can only peer through doorways to the ornate interiors.  The tombs are embedded in the floor with a long, triangular shaped column lying on the ground, which wasn’t as wide as a human body.  There were a few of these “columns” that were only have the length as the others and it made me wonder if they were graves for children.

Those are three tombs in the forefront.

Fancy schmancy.

I’m not sure if there was more to the tombs that was closed off due to the construction efforts, but it only took me about 10 minutes to see what I could see, and I was ready to move on.

Only a stone throws away was stop #3, El Badi Palace.  The name is often translated to the “Incomparable Palace” or “Palace of Wonder/Brilliance”.  However, the structure is pretty much ruins now although the main outer walls are still standing. 

The footprints of rooms in the palace.

Into the massive interior courtyard.

Built by the Saadian sultan Ahmad al-Mansur from 1578 to 1593, its purpose was to showcase his wealth and power and was mainly used for receptions.  After his death in 1603 (he didn’t get to enjoy it for long…) and thanks to the decline of the Saadian dynasty, the place fell into ruin and many of the materials, especially marble, were repurposed for other buildings in the city.  So there wasn’t much to see, and like the Saadian tombs, my visit was relatively short.

There was a couple of large pools in the center of the courtyard.

A 360 view from the middle of the courtyard.

The last landmark I checked out before heading to the medina was Bahia Palace.  This was practically a brand new palace compared to El Badi since it was constructed in the 1860s.  The palace has an irregular layout comprising around 150 rooms organized around multiple internal riad garden courtyards (which is a rectangular area divided into four quadrants by two stone or paved paths).

 

Sorry, it was hard to get a good angle for a photo in this courtyard.

The thing that most struck me about this place was the love for ornate, decorative ceilings.  Now all the rooms were missing their original furniture pieces but still, it seemed to be all about the ceilings.

My first of a number of photos of the ceilings. 

It was busier that the rundown El Badi palace and since there were so many doorways to this room or that courtyard, it almost felt like tourists, myself included, were rats in a maze.

Ceilings, ceiling, ceilings...

There were some pieces of artwork for sale in one room.  They seemed to be from the same artist as they all looked similar.

One of the bigger courtyards with renovations on the left hand side...more fixing to be done in Marrakesh.

A courtyard under construction in the palace.

Again, after about 20 minutes, I was satisfied that I had seen what could be seen.  That was three attractions, each costing 100 dirhams to enter ($45 CAD total), which I had completed in about an hour and a half.  Well, that added up quickly.  Time to just wander around what will likely be the most interesting part of the heart of the city, the famous “Medina of Marrakesh”.

The horse drawn carriage outside the post office is nice, but I was more interested in the old man in the red who was being helped along by a young man.  I assume it was his grandson.

Into the maze of the medina.

Perfume anyone?

Hard to see in the photo...but there are humans as far as the eye can see...

...but it wasn't all crazy busy.

That's quite the outfit!

I actually expected it to be a bit busier and more chaotic.  The shop owners hardly hassled me.

Some poor women look like they are begging, but in fact they are selling small packages of tissues, which is, if you know me with my hayfever, right up my alley!  Yes, I know, that they are still in dire straits.

This caught my eye as a strange scene.  A cat sitting patiently, hoping that the butcher might be kind and chuck him something, which was bookended by the dangling carcasses still sporting their testicles

Speaking of cats...look at these cool cats.  I assume they were Senegalese due to the flag onthe guy's t-shirt.  They look like they could be in this awesome video by "Brushy One String":  Chicken in the Corn

After only about five minutes of walking through the medina, I popped out into a famous square and market place called Jemaa el-Fnaa.  It is lined with shops and numerous cafes and restaurants.  

Walking into Jemaa el-Fnaa square.

A nice overhead view of the square, courtesy of Wikipedia.

The origin of the strange sounding name (is it the name of a Star Wars character?!?) is unclear.  Jamaa means “congregation” or “mosque” and fana can mean “death”.  Another meaning could be “The assembly of death” or “The Mosque at the End of the World” according to Wikipedia.  It was a site of public executions about a thousand years ago, so who knows.

However, it is known by tourists as a spot where your money is sought after by various peddlers and buskers that we don’t typically see in the Western world.  Acrobatic performers standing on each others’ heads is common, although I actually didn’t see any.  But then there are snake charmers and guys with macaques dressed up in human-like clothes that will jump on your shoulder for a Kodak moment.

I definitely did not want to support the exploitation of monkeys, nor really snakes, but I didn’t feel that was as bad.  On later research online, yeah, it’s not good for the snakes either as they are often dehydrated or drugged so they are not aggressive (the cobras at least)…but monkeys are like little humans.  

What craziness is there to be seen?!?

Walking through the square, the first of the two spectacles that I saw was the snakes.  I tried to surreptitiously snap a pic of the cobras as I walked by but of course, I was immediately approached by one of the touts.  He asked me where I was from and was quick to offer a small, harmless water snake that he wrapped around my neck.  That didn’t bother me as I had a large, heavy anaconda around my neck in the jungles of Peru about 4 years ago (you can see that post here).  The man grabbed my phone, walked the other side of a few cobras and some other larger snake, had me kneel down and snapped a bunch of pics and photos while some of his partners banged away on some drums.

That's me in the background holding the little, harmless watersnake...you can hardly see it.  But I've never seen a cobra before.

I like the shadow of the cobra.

Afterwards he took back the water snake and presented a hat while asking for a donation.  He suggested that it should be paper money, so a minimum of 20 dirhams ($3 CAD).  I pulled out 50 dirhams, which I thought was plenty generous, but he complained that it was for the whole group and it was not enough.  I firmly told him that I thought that was sufficient and walked away while he continued to aggressively plead for more.  It turned out to by the only somewhat bad interaction I had with a local while in the medina.

The Africa Cup of Nations football (soccer) tournament is happening in Morocco so these are the flags of all of the countries who have qualified.

I bought a Moroccan flag from this man who was hobbling around with a clubfoot.  He was completely opposite to the snake charmers with a lovely smile and he was very appreciative of my business.

Heading back into the medina.

Such cute little outfits.

Sweets anyone?  I love how the vendor just seems to appear in the middle of all of his goods.

Soooo much stuff...

Shop after shop...

This shop reminded me of my friend Bala as he love chess....so many different kinds of boards.

It was busy in some spots.

Love the colours!!!

I had to chuckle at myself.  I'm not much of a shopper but I did purchase a few small things.  At one shop, I saw these cute painted signs.  I chatted with the shop owner who stated that he loved that I was from Canada and he had friends in Montreal.  A French woman and her daughter came into his stall and asked about prices and did a bit of haggling, then left. I was offered better pricing than she was, as I was "Canadian".  I was sure that I could still do better on the one sign, but then saw a second one I wanted so went for a different price for the tow of them.  I played the "I'll come back, I'm just going to look around" card, but he then agreed to my price.  I hadn't seen any other shops like this one so I felt pleased with my bargaining (not my forte, nor is shopping in general).  Well within the next half an hour of walking around, I must have seen 6-8 shops with the same signs...like this one below.  Yeah, I probably paid too much! 

Voodoo anyone?!?

Hmm...not for me thanks.  Note the two long snake skins by the zebra hide.

It's December 23rd, and this was the only sign of Christmas I saw, which is not surprising since it's a Muslim country.  This little decorated tree was in a lobby of a hotel.

I saw another tourist looking over the road towards this, which caught my attention too.  Look at this car...check the next photo...

How is he supposed to get out?!?

I walked around the medina for about 45 minutes more, actually getting a bit lost, which is what you’re supposed to do…and then found my way out as the sun was getting lower in the sky.  I’d spent about 3 hours walking around the old part of Marrakesh and felt like I had seen enough.  Many blog websites I had read before coming to the city stated that 2-3 days was the amount of time required to see the major sites and get a feel for Marrakesh, but I was happy with what I had done and seen.

I had a mellow evening in the van and was surprised that it was quiet overnight.  There was a bit of loud thumping music for around twenty minutes at 11 pm, but that was it.  I was pleasantly surprised.

The evening call to prayer.

The next day I awoke to grey skies and rain and that confirmed it…I pulled the plug on Marrakesh and started yet another 3-hour drive, this time toward the small city of Essaouira.