Casablanca

I forgot to mention yesterday that Rabat was once a pirate state. Bou Regreg and the fort was it and it carried on as a state until about 1830s when the Austrians got the hump because the pirates had nicked one of their ships, and bombarded the place in retaliation. But the piratical ways continued into the 19th century.

Rabat is probably the most French looking place we've seen yet and could easily be a suburb of Paris. Tall apartment buildings and verandas but with Islamic furnishings around doors and widows;its very elegant and in its colonial heyday must have been very nice albeit the French only took over in 1912.

Got the 11am local train to Casablanca -like one of those two storey commuter trains that run from Paris to its suburbs.

Good views from the top deck of the ocean and cultivated fields in between. But the ticket hall was under the main concourse and had a glass ceiling. See, they do exist....

Not that impressed with Casablanca though. To be fair, it's a commercial city rather than a cultural centre and they seem to be digging most of of up around the train station at least.

We walked into the city, having fended off taxi drivers at the station looking for fares. There are some nice buildings, again giving an immediate impression of the French influence.

A hotel that we found in Lonely Planet was too much of a dive for even us, so we left for another across the road which was slightly better.

Nadine didn't feel well so she went back to had room while I went for a walk. We're right in Central Casablanca so the main square, and focus of Frenchness, Place Mohamed V,is just up the road. The law courts and main post office are there.The door to the court is massive and is apparently based on a Persian Iwan which is the entrance to a medrassa.

There were loads of people in the gardens in the park, just sitting around or strolling, and almost as many pigeons, the latter of which were sitting on a dry fountain. Unlike in London, people were being encouraged to feed them.

The post office is still a post office and is spectacular inside, all arches and marbled floors with wrought iron grilles covering the offices in the upstairs corridors. I sneaked up there when the guard left his post and took a few snaps of the place from higher up before being shooed out.

Further on, things started getting tattier and dilapidated although interspersed were some really flash modern things like the trams.

But there was also rubbish lying around and people sleeping in doorways and hanging about, although litter seems to be in piles, rather than just strewn about. It's not a dirty place as such but it is definitely seedy and has seen better days.

It's very different to the places we have been so far, as is the ethnic mix. The place feels different too and it is clearly a place of considerable immigration. There are also a few social problems as well, with quite a bit of drunkenness - ironically in the gardens just outside the court building -and drug taking; there is a bloke sniffing glue just across the street from our hotel right now.