Marrakesh

Marrakesh is a red city at the foot of the Atlas Mountains, whose jagged line closes the horizon to the south. Everything turns around Jemaa el-Fnaa, the great square that fills as the day goes down with orange-juice carts, storytellers and the smoke of grills. Around it spread the souks of the medina, thick with the smell of leather, mint and spices. The minaret of the Koutoubia Mosque marks the skyline above the flat roofs. The city keeps its finest things behind walls: the cedar ceilings of the Bahia Palace, the carved courtyard of the Ben Youssef Madrasa, the bamboo and hard blue of the Jardin Majorelle. The El Badi Palace, stripped of its marble by a later sultan, is now an open ruin where storks nest on the ramparts. Tagine slow-cooked since morning and pastilla, sweet and savoury at once, are what people eat here, and the Ouzoud Waterfalls drop into a gorge a few hours away.