I visited the most advanced country in Africa ¦ Morocco

Morocco, I couldn't believe my eyes. This country has gone from a developing nation to one of the most advanced countries in Africa. Morocco has been quietly reshaping its future, from high-speed trains to green energy, large automobile manufacturing industry to advanced port infrastructure. And in 2023, it became the most visited country in Africa, tallying with Egypt and attracting north of 14 million visitors. I've never seen this much people. Morocco will stage the 2025 edition of the Africa Cup of Nations. In 2025, Morocco will host the AFCON Games and in 2030 will co-host the FIFA World Cup. This speaks so much about this northern African country. Over the next few days, I'll be traveling through four different cities in Morocco, exploring what really make them unique but more importantly, finding answers as to why this country seems to be way ahead of other African countries. As a renowned tourist destination, I'll also be exploring some of the best tourist attractions and show you how you can plan yourself an exciting itinerary if you're thinking of visiting Morocco. I would appreciate it if you subscribe to the channel and please give this video a like so more people can see this awesome story. My adventure here in Morocco starts off from Casablanca, Morocco's biggest city and the economic capital. Accommodation here isn't so expensive and you can trace it to the fact that Casablanca isn't a touristic city. However, I was told of a neighborhood called the Casa Finance City, where property prices can go through the roof and in 2024, it was the most popular neighborhood for real estate in the Moroccan industrial city of Casablanca. Casablanca is located on Morocco's Atlantic coast with a population north of 4 million. This city is where young Moroccans come to seek their fortunes, where business and creative industry prosper. Morocco is the largest manufacturer of automobile in Africa, beating South Africa that was previously on the number one spot. Most of that manufacturing happens here in Casablanca Somaka Facility, one of the biggest automobile manufacturing factories in all of Africa. It looks like the future of automotive manufacturing for market in Africa, made in Morocco and produced here in Casablanca. As I drove through Casablanca, the French colonial architectural style couldn't go unnoticed. Before independence in 1956, Morocco was a French protectorate, while Spain controlled the northern region of Morocco. That is why cities like Tetouan still speak Spanish, while majority of Moroccans would speak French and then Arabic. The Hassan II Mosque at 9,000 square meters, it was Africa's largest mosque and the fifth largest in the world, but lost that title to Algeria just recently. Mecca is located east of Casablanca and that explains why. The mosque is built predominantly over the Atlantic Ocean and it's one of the many tourist hotspots in Morocco. It's open to tourists but at the moment I think it's closed for prayers. If you want to visit, you probably have to get here in the daytime, probably between 10 and 4 pm. I am fascinated about how well organized and developed the public transportation in Morocco is. I'm very impressed actually with the public transportation system here. As a matter of fact, after a decade of construction and planning, in 2018 Morocco launched its high-speed train called the Albora. Morocco has inaugurated Africa's fastest train. The train will have traveling time between the commercial and industrial hubs of Casablanca and Tangier. The journey between the two cities will now take around two hours only. The train travels on a dedicated high-speed line and reaches speeds of up to 320 kilometers or 109 miles per hour. The high-speed line was completed at a total cost of 2.4 billion dollars and took seven years to construct. If you're looking to explore different cities in Morocco, there is no better way than by train. So to experience this firsthand, I decided to hop on a train to the touristic city of Marrakech but I had to do a quick stop at the capital city of Morocco. After a one-hour train ride, I arrived at Rabat. Welcome to Rabat. Morocco's capital rests along the shores of the Atlantic Ocean. On arriving in Rabat, I couldn't help but marvel how developed, clean and well-organized this side of Morocco is. You see how developed it is? It's clean, it's serene, the grasses are well manicured, the sun is good and there are like several tunnels, flyovers. Oh by the way, this tunnel runs underneath the Casbah. And right there is the tallest building in Africa, right there. The Mohammed VI Tower is the top highest building in Africa at 55 stories. Rabat is known for its landmarks that speak to its Islamic and French colonial heritage like the Hassan Tower, a building you almost cannot miss. It's a minaret of an incomplete mosque commissioned near the end of the 12th century. This is the mausoleum. It's actually a tomb where the past king Mohammed V was buried with two of his sons. I wasn't allowed to film inside the tomb. The interior looks expensive and it is manned by the king's guard. I only wondered why a big building like this serves as a tomb and why the guards are still protecting the corpse. You want to give me a flower? Free? Bite, bite, bite. Oh, I thought she wants to give me flowers. That was like, I was about to say nobody gives men flowers and a random person was just going to give me flowers. That would have been the cutest thing ever though. So it is then time to visit the popular city known by so many people, Marrakesh. All right, so this is going to be my apartment for the next six days here in Marrakesh. Let's look around. So this is the living room just here and behind me is the kitchen. I don't plan on doing any cooking. I might stay here. I like the interior design. It looks pretty. So this is the room, what it looks like. The one bedroom, one bathroom. It has an open kitchen and dining, a living room, internet and a very nice neighborhood. But one thing I don't like about Marrakesh already is like the temperature here seems to be very hot. 40. So if you're in Marrakesh, I think I can get like a good deal with the owner for you. You can book this place and stay. So you're going to find all the details in my travel guide linked in the description of this video. Marrakesh is known for its early morning hot air balloon experience and of course, I wanted to try it out. So the next morning, I was picked up by 4.30 to the launch point which was about half an hour drive from Marrakesh towards the rising mountain. They're just setting up the balloons right now. Before I soared high over the timeless Agafi desert, I was welcomed with a coffee. It was then time to take off and in a few minutes, we're high up in the sky just right in time when the sun started to rise. I have flown a hot air balloon in Tanzania and Egypt but there was just something very special about this flight here in Marrakesh and now I understand why I was advised not to miss this experience. After I arrived, I got to refill with the barber's breakfast here in a traditional Moroccan setting. So we have some salmon, some kind of bread and yeah, Moroccan bread. I have banana, jam and olives and then you have oranges and the Moroccan tea. I ended that morning by riding quad bikes in the Agafi desert. It was nice. On my travel guide, I will share details about how you can book this experience and how much it costs. FYI, for most of you that don't know, I do have a travel guide PDF I made after traveling 15 days in four cities exploring Morocco. Traveling to a new country where you don't know anyone and don't have a fat wallet to splurge can be difficult. A lot of people ask me how I travel to these places, meet people and get things for cheap. To answer all of these questions, inside my travel guide PDF, you'd find contact of the tour operators I used and the personal tour guides like the one you see in my videos that would help you plan your trip and get things for cheap like I did. You'd also find accommodation options, how to book the trains, the best areas to visit in each city, the best time to visit and the strategy you can use to get cheap deals. But more importantly, I would suggest a perfect itinerary you can just copy so you don't have to spend days schooling on Expedia or TripAdvisor looking for a perfect Moroccan itinerary. Look at the description section of this video to download the travel guide and of course, the first 20 persons will get it for free if you use this coupon code. So arriving Marrakech, the first thing that you're going to notice is all the colors of the buildings, they are all the same. Marrakech is known as the red city because of the color of its building. This is the first thing you would notice here other than the high temperature of 45 degrees. So get ready to drink plenty of water. The buildings in Marrakech are painted in red ochre and even the local taxes to match the color of the surrounding land also giving the city a distinctive hue. Most of the buildings are painted in this reddish brownish color. Yeah, just like which you can see all of this. Yeah, most of the buildings you find in Casablanca are white. Yeah, I think that's also where the name is derived. Casablanca, which is white, white, white, white house. Yeah. To learn more about Marrakech, there are a few places of interest I needed to visit. So we are at the Madrasa Ben Youssef. The first impression entering this structure is that of magnificent, the colors, the light, the richness of the details and materials used for the decoration of this Quranic school, which at the time was the largest in North Africa. This place served as an intellectual hub for students from different parts of the world to come learn things about Islam, science, art. Today, it's a cultural site in Morocco that attracts a lot of tourists every day. So what you're going to find very common, especially in the architectural design here in Morocco, the repeating patterns that you're going to see on the wall, you're going to find such, you know, inscription and architectural style in most, you know, buildings here in Morocco. And it's very interesting to see, like, they are preserving that their native way of designing buildings, which is something that I feel a lot of African countries should imitate rather than looking too modern, right? And we should just learn from Morocco, learn from the way that they are reserving and preserving all of these things native to them. It's just very beautiful. Look at the patterns, a mix of like white, brown. It's beautiful, guys. A few steps inside the chaotic and buzzing Medina, you'd find the secret garden of Marrakech. But the secret garden was built in the 16th century from the Sultan Moulay Abdullah. It used to be a Riyadh that was abandoned, and then it was renovated, you know, into this beautiful space. So he built this Riyadh just like to relax, quiet place. That's the meaning of the Riyadh. A Riyadh is, you know, a traditional Moroccan home with a garden. And it's usually owned by, you know, merchants, traders, people from maybe the royal families as well. It shows you what a typical Riyadh looks like in the Moroccan society. So how many people visit here a day? Any average number? Sometimes like 5,000, sometimes 6,000 persons in the day. 6,000 persons just come to look at the garden? Yeah. Guys, come on, man. But the garden with history, my friend. As we walked around, we noticed a huge square. I was told it changes its face as the hours go by. It is silent in the morning and very busy at night. You want a big one? No. Bro, what if this snake does bite you now? It's a garden snake, so it's harmless. It's harmless, eh? They can bite, but they don't have venom. That's definitely not gonna be me, no. I'm not putting that thing on my body, no. Guys, we are right here at the Jamilfna Square in Marrakech. It is crazy. A lot of people. You have magicians trying to perform. You have storytellers. You have also like people selling arts and crafts, restaurants, local markets. And also the snake charmers as well. Like, yo, it's a whole entertainment ground. You're gonna find like little circles and there's usually like a performance happening on there. So I'm just gonna go see what it's all about, get entertained, get some drinks. And just enjoy the nightlife here in Marrakech. This place actually has an interesting history. Because from what I heard, it used to be an execution square. But then like over time, you know, it transformed. And now you have people performing, people telling stories, snake charmers, musicians. All of that, all of them here at night. Not just that, you also have like, you know, people selling food, selling, you know, items, whatever you want to buy, you probably would find here. There are a couple of places I visited on a day trip from Marrakech. And I will suggest the same for you as well. The first was to Orica Valley, which is a beautiful valley in Morocco. That's a popular day trip option from Marrakech, located on the foothill of the high Atlas mountain. Here, I learned about how the traditional Beba people live. This is a traditional refrigerator. This is like a refrigerator for them, like a local one. Can I touch one of the drinks? Okay, it's cold. Yeah, it's cold. The cool water comes from top of the mountain and the locals utilize it to chill their drinks. It surprisingly works. So how long to make something like this? One day. One day to make this? I hiked up the mountains and we got to the waterfall and I was shocked at how many people came here to experience this as well. Orica Valley is known for its breathtaking scenery, the traditional Beba's village and many waterfalls. The second day, I embarked on a trip to Eid Benadud, located in the foothill of the southern slope of the high Atlas in the province of Ordzizet. The province of Ordzizet houses the Nour Orzizet power plant. At 510 megawatts, this is the world's largest concentrated solar power plant that costs $9 billion to build. Renewable energy is big business for Morocco. The country has the capacity to produce 37% of its power from renewable energy and it is targeting 52% by 2030. And much of that comes from here, Nour Orzizet. It is spread out over 3,000 acres, the equivalent of 300 football fields. But what brought me here to Orzizet is to visit Eid Benadud's impressive scar which stands at the foot of the cliff and evoke a sense of having traveled back in time. A striking example of southern Moroccan architecture. So we're walking closer to Eid Benadud. So the village you see, it's very old. It's from 11th century, like 1,100 years. A key to Eid Benadud's importance is that it's a very popular stop to the wrath of traders traveling between Marrakesh and the Sahara, transporting gold, silver, and spice. One of the great features of Eid Benadud's car, which made it a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1987, is a standard of preservation and authenticity. The buildings, for example, have been maintained using original materials. Everything you see in the old village, like the materials, it just comes from mud. Because tradition of mud, they have something very important, like cheaper for work, second, and mud, they have good climate. They make like a good climate, like isolation. Like in summer, they make cold. In winter, they make different. Just problem for this material, for family. Every one year or like two years, three years, a lot of renovated restoration. Why? Because there is big problem from rain. So there is a lot of rain. So that means a lot of work, a lot of renovation. Eid Benadud architecture provides a perfect set for films and TV series. It is now part of the history of cinema, both as a backdrop and a character in many hugely successful Hollywood films. One of the most significant is the numbers of movies that have featured this village. This location has been featured in Gladiator, Game of Thrones, The Mummy, and 20 other famous movies to exhaustive to mention. And they're in the river, in this place in the river. In 2012, there are people used for Game of Thrones. You see Game of Thrones. Game of Thrones. For season three, Khaleesi with dragon. And the first Gladiator in this place. And also, and the second Gladiator in same place. It's with the actor with Denzel Washington. And last three months ago, there is another movie, but it's like series. It's Outer Banks. Outer Banks. Yeah, Outer Banks, like number four. Climbing the staircase. Yo, the stairs are noisy. How many steps? I don't know, but the steps were created by Unesco World Heritage for tourists. Because before, it used to be quite difficult to climb. So now, there's a lot of stairs. I'm not sure if you can see very well. But right there, you're going to have, this is the new village, Ibn Adu. But we're standing at the old village. So a lot of people have left the old village to the new village. Because life here is going to be difficult. No electricity, no water, you know, no cooling system. So I think it's majorly a tourist destination now. We're just five families living here. My name Mahjoub. Where are you from? Ait Ibn Haddo. I was born in old village. If you're a fan of moving picture, a few kilometers, you would find the Atlas Film Studio in Orzezet. Some of the big blockbusters have been filmed here too. Wow, it's so surreal to be actually where all of these movies are made, man. It's crazy. Everything here is staged. Like from A to Z, all staged. And when they show you the movie, you think it's like a real place. But it's not real. It's staged. Look at this. And this is a marketplace in adventure of Aladdin, Moses, Morocco movies, Arabic movies. It's a marketplace here. Atlas Studio in Morocco has some of the diverse locations within the studio walls. In just steps, you can go from feeling like you're in ancient Egypt to a Buddhist temple. This area has become a very popular choice for Hollywood, starting from the Lawrence of the Arabian in 1992. And since then, it has been used for movies and TV shows like The Gladiator, The Mummy and Prison Break. The studio is one of the largest in the world at over 300,000 square feet. Its popularity comes from its reliable climate that can mimic variety of countries. Till today, it is still used as a film set. And I was very privileged to come here. As my adventure ended in Marrakech, I decided to visit the coastal city of Tangier. The first thing you should know about Tangier is it is the closest point to Europe, just 14 kilometers away. Just direct in front of you, over there, you see Spain. Today is a little bit foggy. We cannot see clear. But if it was clear weather, we can see directly Spain from there. 14 kilometers away. So for people who are in Spain and they want to visit Tangier or something, there is a ferry. Actually, at night, you can even see lights coming in from Europe. A lot of immigrants would travel here to Tangier to get into a raft boat and sneak illegally into Europe. Most immigrants don't make it across alive. And I just wept for all the bodies that have been swallowed by this ocean. Morocco is now a gateway international market, home to 22 shipping ports and the largest port here in Tangier, called Tangier Med. It handles over 100 million tons of cargo in a single year. And that includes hundreds of thousands of cars produced in Morocco. After one hour, 30 minutes drive from Tangier, I made it to the blue village of Chefchaouen, built on a mountainside and a bucket list destination for me. So welcome guys to the blue city, the blue village of Chefchaouen. Chefchaouen is a city with a special vibe. With its blue-rinsed houses, the whole city seems to be bathed in bright, light blue rays. Why is it blue? Is it like everybody decided to paint their houses blue? It had a lot of Jewish people. The Jewish was living in Spain and they were refugees and they came to this village. And the blue color for the Judaism, for the Jewish religion, is something very spiritual and something very valuable. And with time, they discovered that the blue color in this hot, in this weather, in the summertime, is making the houses from inside cooler. Also the blue color is kicking off all the mosquitoes. Oh really? Yeah. Mosquitoes don't like blue color? Doesn't like blue color. Content creators, influencers, famous people. They discovered this place, they came over here, they shoot, they do a lot of social media things and Instagram and everything. It's become very popular. The people in here is very easy, very easygoing, very simple. They don't have big needs like other countries. How many people right now live in Chefchaouen? Do you have that number? Around like 450,000. I learned that the local government still gives out pin brushes to locals each spring to help keep the towns look blue. Everything here is blue, like I'm in front of someone's house. There are several restaurants, shops and hotels. They even got rental apartment for tourists that want to spend a few nights here. You know what's the average price of like if you want to rent? Rent for a night? Yeah. So depends, it starts from like 30 bucks, 30 dollars. 50 dollars up to 100 dollars. It depends how many people, it depends if the property is big or not. Yeah. On my way back, I passed through the city of Tetouan, nicknamed the white dove of the Mediterranean Sea. Welcome to Tetouan, guys. All this city is painted in a white color. Oh, really? Yeah. And it was under Spanish colony for a long time. And this bird over there, this is a symbol of freedom. More than half the population here speaks Spanish because it was a Spain colony before independence. When people come here to Tetouan, what are the things that they can do? It's very famous by the summertime. Yeah, what is it? By the beaches, the beautiful beaches. Yeah, a lot of water activities here. Water activities, jet ski, boats. Yeah. Kayak, banana boat, things like this. Why would local people prefer to live here in Tetouan and not Marrakech or Casablanca or Rabat? Easy answer, because Marrakech doesn't have a beach. Oh, yeah. And the weather in Marrakech is not the same weather here in Tetouan or Tangier. Yeah. It's very different. We have here Mediterranean weather, so you can never get boring from it. Right. Also, it's healthy. Why are the buildings painted white here? The white building is coming also from the symbol of freedom because it has two colors, the green and the white. And as you see over there, all the building is painted in green and white. Not only white, but green and white symbol of freedom. Now I understand why the beach is packed and full with a lot of people. This is the beach capital of Morocco. Everybody's up there in their bikinis. But for me, I'm just here to see, to explore, take some photos. I've never seen this much people in the beach, man. Like, I just wanted to show you guys what you can do if you come here to Tetouan and you're in search of activities to do, actually. You can rent yourself, like, you can do kayaking, you can get a jet ski. There's a lot of, like, aquatic activities. You can even do the group tours. I think they're going to take you on a boat. And for the boaters out there, you can rent yourself a yacht, go on, like, I don't know, a sunset or sunrise cruise or whatever. But it seems like this is where it's going down. You see a lot of luxurious yachts and boats and everything. And those yachts are private. But in the summertime, their owners, they give them for rent to make a business. Like, you want, for example, to go for a day trip, it costs you, like, 3,000 U.S. dollars. Also, we have this apartment over here, beach apartment. If you come to spend the weekend or the summer or something, you must pay minimum, like, 3, 350 U.S. dollars for a night. Yeah. Also, you have everything close to you. The beach, the water sports activities, everything you think about. The restaurants, the coffees, shops, all what you need is over there. So, like, you are in paradise. So, we're at the point right now where the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic meet together. And it's just right behind that rock. So, you can see, like, a lot of people come here to see that. I spent the rest of my time in Tangier visiting several areas like the Medina and the Grand Soko. In here, we call it the Kasbah. The Kasbah is a Berber word because here in Morocco, we are divisible by the Arabs and the Berber people. This is the whole map of the whole area. This is the whole map. And in here, if you see the gray thing, this is the narrow streets. All right. So, the narrow streets, which is making any Medina here in Morocco like a maze. If you don't have a tour guide, you get lost. A lot of local people live here, right? Yeah, 20,000 local people live here. 20,000 local people. Local people, they are living over here like those businesses. We call them family businesses. You find the owner living upstairs and he has a shop down. He closes whenever he wants. Even people are here are very satisfied. They are not like needy like other countries. They need villas and then they born over here. They die over here and they feel very, very comfortable from what they have and everything. My name is Hafid. I play music in the streets. My Instagram is hafidwselma. And I also drove through a neighborhood where the king lived. And you can see how beautiful it looks like you're in California. After spending 15 days in Morocco, learning about the history, the economy of the country, I'm already planning another trip. This country has one of the richest of cultures that I have seen. Their native architecture is still very much reserved in the country. The friendliness of people cannot go unnoticed. And the rapid development is fast making this country my most favorite African country. Please visit Morocco. And when you do, please download my travel guide. Link is in the description section below. Until the next episode, I'll see you guys soon.