Asilah→tangier→chefchaouen
4dInterest
Literary Tangier
Bowles, Burroughs, and the writers who made Tangier legendary — the cafés still serve the same mint tea and the city still doesn't explain itself.
Asilah
Asilah is a small medina on the Atlantic coast, 46 kilometres south of Tangier. The Portuguese built the fortifications in the 15th century. The Spanish took it. The Moroccans took it back. What remains is a quiet walled town on the water with whitewashed streets and painted murals that change every year.
The Asilah Arts Festival, held each summer since 1978, invites artists to paint directly on the medina walls. The murals are temporary — each year's festival paints over last year's work. The result is a town that reinvents its surfaces annually while the stone beneath stays the same.
Outside the ramparts, the beach runs north toward Cap Spartel. The town has a handful of good restaurants serving grilled fish and seafood. The harbour is small and active. On Thursdays, the souk outside the walls fills with produce from the Loukkos plain.
Asilah is an easy day trip from Tangier or a quiet overnight stop on the coast road south to Rabat.
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Journeys that pass through Asilah
Asilah→tangier→chefchaouen
5dInterest
Matisse's Morocco
Tangier transformed Matisse's colour — and he transformed European painting. The light hasn't changed. The windows haven't moved.
Asilah→tangier→larache→rabat
6dInterest
Roman Morocco
Volubilis, Chellah, Lixus — following Rome's African frontier through ruins most visitors never find.
Plan your visit
Coming to Asilah?
Every journey we design includes private guiding, accommodation chosen for character rather than category, and the kind of access that takes years in Morocco to arrange.
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