If you’ve seen pictures on Instagram of a blue city with pretty doors, chances are its Chefchaouen, arguably the bluest city in the world.
The origin of how the city got its colour is not certain. Some say that the Jewish people who fled Hitler painted the walls blue to represent the sky, which in turn represents the heavens. Others say it’s to repel mosquitoes. We certainly didn’t see any mosquitoes during the three days we spent there.. so we’ll go with the latter theory.
Accommodation
Our hotel is a short 5-minute walk from the main square. We stayed in the grand suite at the Lina Ryad and Spa Hotel. This is a beautiful boutique hotel with just 17 rooms. We were greeted with mint tea (which is traditional in Morocco) and warm smiles.
Our room was beautiful. But the views right outside our room were even better. We had a whole terrace to ourselves and we made the most of it lounging around the next couple of days. We were told that the hotel has a pool which we could book for ourselves. So we took up the offer and booked 2 hours for the following day. How cool is that? Never had this at any other hotel we’ve stayed at.
We paid £129 per night for this incredible stay and it was definitely worth the splurge. As we said in a previous post, we tend to stay at budget-friendly hotels for most of our trips, but splurge for the last two days or so. This is our advice for people looking to travel – don’t spend a fortune on hotels if you’re just going to use it to sleep.
Shop
We didn’t shop much in the other cities as we heard that Chefchaouen is much better in terms of prices. The choices are limited here but we found what we wanted. We got a beautiful blue rug for 150MAD and a Moroccan bean bag for 400MAD.
Eat
The food here is amazing. And very cheap. I think the most we spent was just under 200MAD. We had some amazing tagines and plenty of fresh juices. We recommend the following restaurants-
Babb sabbour – try their taginiya and goat tagine
Lala Masouda – try their eggplant and zucchini as a starter and couscous and anchovies tagine as a main course. The mango and orange juice were super tasty as well!
Sofia restaurant – their pastilla was superb!
Walk
Walk around the medina. You’ll find endless places to take pictures. And a lot of stray cats. A LOT! Also, be sure to check out the green door! We had a magical experience there. You can read about it here.
Relax
We spent most of our time lounging around in our terrace taking in the views of the surrounding Rif Mountains and blueness of the medina. We bought a sheesha (typical price is 120 MAD – do not pay more than that) and enjoyed it out at the terrace as we watched the sunset over this beautiful city.
Granted, there’s more to do in this city. But this was the last stop on our trip and we paid a lot for the hotel, so we just wanted to chill and relax. We had an amazing time in this very beautiful city and met some lovely Moroccan people who we had nice chats with. I think we’ll definitely come back…
Happy travels,
Amana
Have a look below to see a walkthrough of Chefchaouen and its beauty.