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A fortified earthen village on the road from the Sahara to Marrakesh, inscribed in 1987. Its communal buildings include a caravanserai and two cemeteries.

A fortified Atlantic port laid out on a European military plan in the 1760s, inscribed in 2001, and called by UNESCO the Port of Timbuktu.

A 42 hectare Roman town on the edge of the empire, inscribed in 1997, that was an Amazigh capital first and an Idrisid one last.

Spring and autumn are the comfortable seasons, but Morocco is really three climates at once, and the one you are packing for decides when to go.

Most visitors enter Morocco without a visa for up to 90 days. The rule that catches people out is passport condition: damage has cost travelers entry.

The dirham is a closed currency. You cannot buy it before you go or take it home, which changes how you plan the first and last hours of the trip.

Morocco asks you to pack for three climates at once. The coast, the High Atlas and the pre-Saharan south are not the same country in the same week.

Morocco kept and extended its railway, so trains link the imperial cities. Where the line stops, coaches and two kinds of taxi take over.

What changes when you travel with twenty people instead of two, and how to plan for it.

Morocco is US Level 2 and carries no Do Not Travel area. The realistic risks are theft, confidence tricks and laws that differ sharply from home.

A tagine is the pot, not the dish. Moroccan cooking runs on slow braises, bread used as a utensil, and mint tea that arrives whether you asked for it or not.

Morocco is Amazigh and Arab, and both languages are official. Knowing which greeting, which hand and which moment to photograph is most of what a visitor needs.

Morocco marks its year with moussems, harvests and horses. Tbourida and the cherry festival at Sefrou are both inscribed by UNESCO in their own right.

UNESCO records Gnawa as beginning with people taken in the slave trade. Morocco is where the Sahara met the Atlantic, and its heritage list says so plainly.

The honest position is that a medina is difficult and a modern Moroccan city is not. Planning around that difference is what makes the country workable.