Casablanca

The last city in Morocco that we stopped in was the famed Casablanca: Morocco's industrial capital and largest city at almost 4 million inhabitants. Casablanca, which in Spanish means "white house", was named by Spanish traders in the late 18th century. Casablanca is on the Atlantic coast, and was much cooler than pretty much anywhere else I had been except maybe Asturias, so it was very refreshing. Despite the nice weather, however, the city isn't really host to a lot of tourist attractions.

Casablanca is much more cosmopolitan than many of Morocco's other cities, like Marrakech and Fès, and we noticed fewer women wearing head scarves and people in general wearing traditional clothing there, although there were certainly some.

The sign on the train station as we arrived in Casablanca:



A Moroccan McDonalds we passed on one of Casablanca's major throughfares:

Casablanca's biggest tourist attraction is the Hassan II mosque, built only about 20 years ago. This mosque is one of the few open to non-Muslims (although only at certain times, in between prayers), and is the second largest mosque on the planet after the mosque in Mecca. As we discovered, it's also a popular place for people to spend time and promenade...a haven for people watchers. Unfortunately we didn't get to Casablanca early enough for a tour inside, but we did walk around the outside for about 20 minutes before dinner.

The minaret of the Hassan II mosque:



Part of the mosque that is still being built, which I believe is supposed to serve as a school:



Beautiful tile work:



A woman and her baby in front of the mosque:



And some men in Moroccan robes:



Some children:



And some young women:



After exploring the mosque, we got dinner at Rick's Café, which claims to recreate the famous café in the movie "Casablanca". Supposedly every night, the piano player plays "As Time Goes By", but there was strangely no piano player when we were there:



The inside of the restaurant where we ate:



The lower level of the restaurant especially looked like the movie:

After Casablanca, we left for Paris...only one more stop!