Rabat, Morocco Summary

Capital of the nation since independence – and, before that, from 1912 to 1956, of the French Protectorate – RABAT is in many ways the city you’d expect: elegant in its spacious European grid, slightly self-conscious in its civilized modern ways, and, as an administrative centre, a little bit dull. If you arrive during Ramadan, you’ll find the main avenues and boulevards an astonishing night-long promenade – at other times, it’s hard to find a café open past ten at night. Rabat, as they tell you in Casa, is provincial.