| | Overview (Source: Frommers) |
250km (155 miles) S of Tangier; 91km (57 miles) N of Casablanca Rabat is considered Morocco's most conservative city. The nation's capital displays a civilized orderliness more akin to Europe, with its citizens quietly going about their business, void of the frantic pace experienced in many other African and Arabic capitals. For some, this conservativeness lacks any attraction, and Rabat is often overlooked in many travelers' itineraries. However, upon investigation, this low-profile yet cosmopolitan city offers a well-proportioned package of sights, restaurants, and history within the walls of its easily negotiated and largely hassle-free centre ville, medina, and kasbah. Spend a day or two exploring Rabat's relatively clean but still mazelike medina, its adjoining cliff-top kasbah, and the tree-lined boulevards of the French-designed centre ville, and you'll discover the city's fascinating past. Rabat has been the nation's capital since the beginning of the protectorate era in 1912, the French preferring its coastal, defendable location to the then-nationalistic capital of Fes. Prior to this, the city's fortunes ebbed and flowed with that of the Oued Bou Regreg ("Father of Reflection" river), which separates Rabat from its historical sister city and now southern suburb, Salé. Early history shows evidence of both Phoenician and Carthaginian settlements on the southern banks of the Bou Regreg. They were followed by the Romans, who established a trading post here aro
....
[ read more on Rabat.. ]
|
| |
