One quick five hour nap after my hot air balloon ride, and I was making my way to La Palais Bahia in the center of Marrakech. Bahia in Arabic means “beautiful” (or “brilliant” depending who you talk to), and this place is exactly that. Despite being located right in the Medina, once you step inside it’s like you’ve entered a whole new world. A world of nothing but peacefulness and quiet tranquility… and of course a multitude of noisy tourists, but I think you get the idea.
After passing through a garden filled with all kinds of trees and flowers in bloom, you only need to hand over 10 dihram (less than $2) to enter the palace. Once inside, you may feel a bit like you’re inside a maze. A really beautiful maze, full of rooms connected by courtyards with fountains, or long hallways with elaborate arches and doorways. And of course the walls, ceilings and floors are decorated with the fancy mosaic patterns typical in Moroccan interior design.
Fun fact: Bahia Palace was actually built to be a harem for the grand vizier of the sultan of Morocco in latter half of the 1800s. It’s said that each of his concubines had a room in the palace and how well he liked her directly related to the size of her room. There are 160 rooms in the palace…
If you’re lucky, you may find a kitten napping in one of the courtyards like I did. Just kidding. You’ll probably see more than that running about acting all cute and kitten-like. After only a week in Morocco I’d seen probably eighty cats. I saw around ten of those in the Bahia Palace gardens.
Til next time!
-C
