Marrakech Kitten

Just spent the day exploring the Jewish Quarter, with a visit to the Palais El Badi in the morning.

Though the Palace is substantially in ruins, and reduced throughout to its red pisé walls, enough remains of El Badi to suggest that its name – “The Incomparable” – was not entirely immodest. The palace was originally commissioned by the Saadian sultan Ahmed el Mansour shortly after his accession in 1578. The money for it came from the enormous ransom paid by the Portuguese after the Battle of the Three Kings. It took his seventeenth-century successor Moulay Ismail over ten years of systematic work to strip the palace of everything valuable, and there’s still a lingering sense of luxury and grandeur.

Around the ramparts of the Palace you get a closer view of the storks that nest on top.

On the far side of the courtyard I was surprised to find the Marrakech Museum for Photography and Visual Arts at MMP+ Project Gallery had a fabulous exhibition by the brilliant American photographer Eve Arnold.

In the afternoon I explored the nearby Jewish Cemetery. It is a very moving experience walking amongst the weather worn tombstones.

As you stroll through the vibrant and winding backstreets of Marrakech, you can’t help but notice that cats are everywhere. This little kitten appeared from nowhere as I made my way back to our riad.