Memories and hints of a travelling IT professional.
Visiting the old Ksar of Äit-Ben-Haddou is a unique pleasure, but the rest of the city is just a collection of restaurants and houses on the opposite side of the river. Most people get there just for some hours and then travel further on. But where to stay if you want to spend a night in the city? On a hill above the city you’ll find the Riad Paradise of Silence, a wonderful guesthouse optimized for that.
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The Medina of Marrakech is a place full of hustle and bustle. Good if you’ve got a Riad booked that serves you as a calm and quite place for the night. The Riad Khabia is located in a derb close to Rue Berrima in the South of the Medina. It feels a bit hidden but it is very good to reach and has nice rooms, very friendly staff and a good roof terrace with great views. But the best reason to book here is the location: you can walk to most of the important places easily.
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The Medina of Fès is car-free and therefore having a Riad close to a city gate or road around is a pure necessity. A good option is the Riad Nazha located in the southern, lower part of the city center. The guesthouse is like a palace and it has a wonderful roof terrace with great views on the Borj Sud fortification. And like always in Morocco you can’t see the beauty of this place from the outside – once you’ve found the door after walking between high houses without decorations an unexpected world opens up.
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When visiting Meknès, the Riad Yacout is a good option for staying overnight. It is not only located directly between the mausoleum of Moulay Ismaïl and the Medina, it is also close to the Bab Mansour city gate and the place Lahdim. Furthermore its entrance is facing the Place Lalla Aouda, a large parking area that can be easily reached by taxi from the train station. What I absolutely enjoyed is the amazing roof terrace of the Riad, giving you great views on the city and the minaret of the mosque being part of the mausoleum.
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Once you reach the medina of Rabat you’ll see that it is entirely surrounded by an ancient city wall. The streets within are mostly traffic-free (with the exception of the Avenue Laalou passing between medina and necropolis), which gives you a nice experience while walking through the old town but also challenges you with the question of how to reach your guesthouse. The Riad Zyo is pretty easy to recht: after passing the Bab Laalou you only need to walk some meters on the Avenue Mohammad V and then turn right into the Rue Moreno. A small plaque at the wall will signal you that you’ve reached your destination.
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Casablanca is the economic powerhouse of Morocco and its medina has unfortunately been destroyed by the earthquake of Lisboa in 1755. It feels acceptable to in this case not aim for a classic guesthouse but to check-in at a plain vanilla hotel. The Hotel Kenzi Basma is located at the Boulevard Hassan I between the medina and the Place Mohammed V with its administrational buildings. From the hotel main entrance it is easy to reach the central Place des Nations-Unies and to access the tramway network.
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It is maybe just another nice hotel of the ibis chain, but it is definitely in a prime location: the ibis Gare Matabiau. From there the main railway station (Gare Matabiau) and the main bus terminal (Gare Routière) are just across the road or better said just across the Canal du Midi. That’s of course especially great if you arrive or leave early in the morning. With that you’re having fast access to places like Andorra or the rest beautiful French cities surrounding Toulouse. You might have to figure out the right road, but it is also only just 15 minutes on foot to the city center and already around the hotel you’ll find good bars and restaurants.
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When the hotels at Banff are fully booked, travel agency typically find alternatives at Canmore which is just a 30 minutes drive on the Trans Canada Highway. The city has a nice city center squeezed into the space between Bow river and the highway and offers all you need for an overnight stay. At the southern end of the city you’ll find the Solara Resort which is a combination of three different hotels (Aurora, Bow, Chinook). Once you arrive get you hotel name, room number and door code (they don’t use keys) from the reception and park in the vast underground carpark.
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Jasper is a nice little city in the Canadian Rocky Mountains and it is mostly lined up at the main road, the Connaught Drive which is located in parallel to the massively used railway tracks (I’ve seldomly seen such long trains) and the Yellowhead Highway. At the northern end of Jasper you’ll find the Tonquin Inn which was my very first North-American style motel: with two levels and parking directly in front of your room door. It is a bit old-fashioned but it was a very pleasant stay with everything available in the close-by city center.
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Kamloops is a city halfway between Vancouver and the Canadian Rocky Mountains. It is located at the Thompson River and seems to be the place for many different contests: during my stay the Scottish Dance Contest was held (at the Sandman Centre) close to my hotel, the Sandman Signature. The hotel is located next to the riverside park and after crossing the railway tracks you’re directly inside the city center with many good restaurant and shopping options.
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