Essaouira
UNESCO World Heritage Site: Medina Of Essaouira, Formerly Mogador (2001), An Eighteenth Century Fortified Atlantic Port Laid Out On A European Grid Plan Inside Moroccan Ramparts · Essaouira, Marrakesh-Safi
Essaouira is the Atlantic wind town: a white and blue fortified port on Morocco's west coast, roughly 175 km from Marrakesh, built from 1764 by Sultan Sidi Mohammed ben Abdallah and laid out to a plan by a European engineer in his service. That plan is why it feels unlike any other Moroccan medina. The streets run in a grid inside the ramparts, so you cannot really get lost, which after Fes or Marrakesh is an enormous relief. People come for the Skala de la Ville, a sea-battered gun platform lined with brass cannon; the Skala du Port with its blue fishing boats, gull racket and sardine grills; the thuya wood workshops and the argan oil of the hinterland; a long beach curving south to Diabat; and the free Gnaoua and World Music festival, which fills the squares in June. The honest caveat is the wind itself. The alizee blows reliably from spring into late summer, which made this a windsurf and kitesurf capital and makes the beach too blustery for lying on for weeks at a time. Essaouira is cool and breezy when Marrakesh is unbearable, and that cuts both ways.
Walled medina and the Skala du Port on the Atlantic, about 175 km west of Marrakesh on the N8 and R207, Essaouira, Marrakesh-Safi, Morocco
The medina is a walled town rather than an attraction, so the streets, the ramparts walk and the port quays have no opening hours, though the gates and the fish market are busiest in the morning. Shops run broadly from mid-morning to seven or eight in the evening, close for Friday midday prayers and shorten sharply through Ramadan, when the town goes quiet in the afternoon and lively after sunset. The ticketed parts are few: the bastion stair at the Skala de la Ville and the small town museum in a restored house keep daytime hours with a weekly closing day - confirm which. The restored Slat Lkahal synagogue opens on a reduced timetable. Getting there: Supratours and CTM coaches run several times daily from Marrakesh in roughly three hours, grand taxis take the same road faster and less comfortably, and Essaouira Mogador airport is about 20 km south with seasonal European flights. Book coach seats and rooms well ahead for July, August and the June festival. Water sports centres work in daylight and shut in winter storms.