Hassan II Mosque

We spent the morning in Casalbanca seeing its main mosque, Hassan II Mosque. This was an other-worldly, incredible, and beautiful mosque. It is much more modern compared to other mosques I've seen on my travels, with construction finishing in the 90s, but it still reflects the style of much more ancient mosques. The size and its position right next to the ocean made it incredibly beautiful to walk around and inside. We got there just as the morning sun began to hit the monument, highlighting the amazingly beautiful building amongst the background of the blue of the ocean and the sky. Not that it needs highlighting as it stands out on its own along the coastline due to its size and the amount of area it occupies. It has an enourmas Plaza area that apparently fills out during ramadan with people praying. The inside can accommodate 25,000, and it is indescribably large. This makes the capacity of the outside Plaza difficult to comprehend. Hundreds of thousands, I would assume. The outside structure is shadowed by an enourmas 200m tall tower in which the muezzin would sing prayers during the olden days. Nowadays, they simply just have speakers up there, removing the need to be able to access the balcony. A shame, because I would have loved to see the view from up there, but access is not allowed. Once you headed inside, it reminded me of the Muslim version of Saint Peter's Basilica in Vatican City. It was huge, but instead of being covered with art, it included the symbols and writings inscribed on the walls, giving it a simplistic yet detailed design. A wall may look bare, but as you approach, thousands of little patterns emerge. The same applies to the archways as they are a collection of thousands of tiny little pieces of Muslim symbols, pillars, and arabic scripts, creating a mosaic of a larger piece of art. The closer you look, the more you see. After about an hour and a tour of the mosque, we reboarded our van and headed toward Rabat.

Rabat was a truly beautiful city, and I was both disappointed and surprised that we didn't spend more time there. The history and culture was abundant all throughout the city. There was clear evidence of the earliest Ottoman occupation through the walled cities of Sala and the Rabat medina. We even got to visit the walled medina of Bab Zaer. While exploring inside, we got to observe the ancient royal quarter and the gardens of the former King. Of course, these have been restored, but they have tried to maintain the general layout and flora and fauna. As such, they had sections for herbs, medicines, aesthetic plants, and fruits. This was during the period in which the Moroccan king, Abu Yusuf, occupied the regions within Southern Spain, and so the aesthetics very much matched that of the Alhambre. Which was a highlight of my time in Spain. Of course, Bab Zaer was a much smaller scale compared to the Alhambra, but the stylistic similarities are clear. I hope this is clear in the photos.

We then visited the ruins of an ancient mosque that started construction in the 12th century. It was due to be the biggest mosque in the world when it was completed, but the death of Abu Yusuf meant that it was never completed. What remains is merely the shell of what would have been a monumental mosque and an unfinished minaret tower where prayers would be sung from. In the end, it was converted into a tourist area (As it was added as a UNESCO world heritage site), an area for prayer, (as a smaller mosque was built along side it), and a mausoleum (where king Mohammed V was buried). He was most well known for resisting French occupation during the 1950s and was commemorated as king once independence was gained. Thus creating the kingdom of Morocco.

After lunch, we could then explore the much more modern sections of the city that were built by the French during its colonial occupation. These buildings are still beautiful, and the Moroccan style of architecture is perhaps my favourite to date. It is Africa, with such a unique flare that makes it so unique. As a result of the short visit, however, there were gallery's, archaeological museums, the ancient city of Sala, and Roman ruins that I didn't get to visit. It is very disappointing as there is a whole ancient Roman walled city that I would have loved to explore. The rest of the ancient Ottoman monuments were spectacularly kept, so I had no doubt the same would be true for the Roman ruins. In the end, it was a very packed day, and I could barely fit in a small portion of the photos I would like to include. Although I would like to be able to have stayed longer in Rabat, it was still a great day. After this exploring, we continued our drive to Meknes and called it a day.Read more