Visit to Mausoleum of Mohammed V and the Kasbah of the Udayas

During the first few days in country we toured three different sites. First was the Mausoleum of Mohammed V. Hassan II was the king of Morocco from 1961 until his death in 1999. He is buried at the Mausoleum of Mohammed V (his father). 

Any description of this day would not be complete without mentioning our awesome and wild tour guide who was a wealth of information and fearlessly led us through the city.

Believe it or not this guy jumped into busy streets numerous times to stop traffic for us. He's more agile than he looks. 

The mausoleum is the white building in the background. Walls surround the entire area which have two guards mounted on horses who change every 90 minutes. 

This is the area inside the walls. The tall building in the background is the Hassan Tower, originally built in 1195, it was meant to be the largest minaret in the world but was never completed. The smaller pillars were meant to be part of the mosque as well but were also left unfinished when construction plans ended with the death of Sultan Yaqub al-Mansour in 1199. 

 More pictures of the mausoleum. The gates on the right are not open to the public.

Here is the tomb where Hassan II is buried. In the top right corner there is an open Koran that is recited by a reader.

The Hassan Tour from a view outside of the walls. 

After visiting the mausoleum we traveled along the coast to the Kasbah of the Udayas. A kasbah is a type of city of Islamic city and this particular one was built around the time of the 12th century. 

The view of the kasbah from along the bay area.

A closer shot of the cliffs surrounding the kasbah. I actually took this in a cafe we went to after our tour.

Once inside the walls, we walked through housing structures that looked like this.

This is a housing complex / mosque that was located at the top of the kasbah over looking the coast...

...which looked like this. I think I could get used to living up here.