Marrakech

By day snake handlers and water sellers work the square and by night food stalls fill it. Every stall carries a number, so the pitches are fixed.

A minaret of 77 metres serves as the point everyone navigates by. No building in the city is permitted to rise above it.

Carved and painted wooden ceilings differ from room to room. Eight courtyards let a visitor walk the shade and stay out of the heat.

A painter patented the deep blue used on the walls and the pots. Cactus and bamboo grow together and the shade comes thick.

Lanes for leather, metal and spice are divided by trade. The branches run so many that retracing the way in is not simple.

A hundred and thirty student cells connect by narrow stairs in this old college. Carved plaster and tile cover the courtyard walls without a gap.

Sealed behind a wall, they were forgotten for over two centuries until 1917. Kings lie in a chamber ringed by twelve marble columns.

Hides soak in round stone vats where the dyeing goes on. The smell is heavy, so a sprig of mint is held to the nose.

A square reservoir sits among olive groves with a pavilion at one end. With clear air the Atlas peaks appear in the water.

The body is softened in a hot room, washed with black soap and scrubbed. Hours are split between men and women and a towel and bowl are brought along.

A riad garden deep inside the medina, revived where an old mansion stood and opened in 2016, split into Islamic and exotic halves. The old channels feeding water beneath the roofs still flow. From the tower, the Koutoubia rises over the rooftops.

Raised by the Saadian sultan Ahmad al-Mansur in the closing years of the 16th century, then stripped of marble by the next dynasty, leaving earth walls and sunken gardens. Storks nest on the broken ramparts. The wall terrace looks over medina and Atlas.

A late 19th-century mansion built for the vizier's brother, now the national museum of Moroccan weaving and carpets. Tribal patterns from all over the country hang next to one another. Visit before carpet shopping in the souks and you will know what to ask.

An old house behind Ben Youssef Madrasa, hung with photographs of Morocco taken from the 1870s into the mid-20th century. Berber villages and desert caravans fill many frames. Its rooftop café is a top medina viewpoint, as much a draw as the prints.

Opened in 2017 beside the Majorelle Garden, rotating the clothes and sketches of a designer who loved this city. The brick facade is laid to mimic warp and weft. Tickets must be bought online in advance, and it closes on Wednesdays.

A working synagogue in the lanes of the Mellah, the old Jewish quarter, its riad courtyard tiled in blue and white. Old photographs of the city's Jewish community hang inside. Visits may not be possible on the Sabbath, so avoid Saturday.

The 12th-century Almohad gate into the kasbah, cut from sandstone in a city otherwise built of earth, with shell motifs and script around the arch. The Saadian Tombs sit just beyond, an easy pairing. Low sun turns the stone red.

An 18th-century royal orchard between the Koutoubia and the city gates, officially Arsat Moulay Abdeslam, turned into a public park. Entry is free, with benches under olive and orange trees. It is where people go when the medina noise wears them down.

A small square north of the main medina, ringed by stalls selling spices, herbs and wicker baskets. Herbalists sometimes set live chameleons and tortoises out front. The rooftop cafés around it give a full view of the stalls below.

The early 20th-century residence of Thami El Glaoui, Pasha of Marrakech, open since 2017 as the Musee des Confluences. Carved ceilings and tiled courtyards draw smaller crowds than the Bahia Palace. The coffee house inside has a long queue; arrive at opening.

An oasis of countless date palms spreading north of the centre, now dotted with villas and hotels. Visitors ride camels or quad bikes along the tracks. The air is cooler than in the medina, so most go toward sunset.

A stony desert of bare hills within an hour by road south-west of Marrakech. No sand dunes, but on clear days the snowy Atlas stands straight ahead. Tent camps serve dinner under the stars, a one-night stand-in for anyone short of time for the Sahara.

A reservoir dammed below the Atlas foothills, reached from Marrakech by car in less than sixty minutes. People lunch at lakeside restaurants and go out by kayak or small boat. Weekends bring city families; weekdays are quiet.

Falls in the Middle Atlas about three hours north-east of Marrakech by car, dropping more than 100 metres in several tiers. Barbary macaques live in the olive trees beside the path down. At the bottom small rafts carry you close to the spray.