Tour Audio a Rabat

Rabat sits at the mouth of the Bou Regreg River where it meets the Atlantic, across the water from its older twin city Sale, and has a quality of contained elegance that Marrakesh and Fes do not. It has been Morocco's political capital since 1912 when the French Protectorate moved the administrative centre here from Fes, and four of its historic elements are collectively UNESCO World Heritage listed: the medina, the Kasbah of the Udayas, the Hassan Tower, and the Chellah necropolis. That is an unusual density of World Heritage Sites for a single city and reflects how much of the Islamic and Almohad past survives within its limits.

The Hassan Tower, an unfinished minaret from the 12th century that was meant to be the tallest in the world when it was commissioned by Sultan Yacoub al-Mansour in 1195, stands on a platform surrounded by the stumps of several hundred columns, all that remains of the great mosque beneath.

The Mausoleum of Mohammed V next to it is the finest example of modern Alaouite architecture in Morocco, with carved plaster, cedar wood, and zellij tilework on a scale that takes some time to absorb. The medina here is smaller and less touristically pressured than Fes or Marrakesh, which makes walking it with a phone in your hand considerably less anxious.