Morocco: Chellah of Rabat

Not far from the Royal Palace is our next stop for the day, the ruins of Chellah. The ruins date back from the Phoenicians and the Romans and you know if you hear Phoenician you know this one’s old. When the Phoenicians abandoned it, the Romans took over in 40 AD changing its name to Sala Colonia. Later on in 14th century a Merenid sultan Abu Hassan built a necropolis on top of the Roman site and built a wall around it. A mosque and other structures were later added.

As with ruins, you see a lot of stones scattered about and would need fertile imagination to see what the ruins were, but many of the structures are intact that you can tell what they are; like the minaret of the mosque stood in good condition despite its age.

Aside from the ruins, Chellah has a garden that features a variety of flowering shrubs and plants. We visited in April and we found the flowers in bloom.

I found out that in today’s world, the Chellah is home to storks and cats. Cats, I am not surprised to find them anywhere and everywhere. In fact, I have packed a bag of kitty treats to share with cats that I find in my travels. On this day though being the first tour day, I forgot to bring the kitty food. Now storks are a different story. I have not seen a stork in person before this day, and lo and behold, I saw a lot of them in one spot. They nest on top of the ruins and they make the most unusual sound. My husband took a video clip but we have not uploaded all the videos he took yet. I don’t know for sure why they are held in high regard by the Moroccans. The storks roam and live free, safe from hunters.

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Next post, I'll be sharing the storks and cats i Chellah.

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Comments

  1. I know you have a thing about cats, Maria, so I'm sure you were in heaven that day. But storks?? I never saw them until coming to the Netherlands where you can find them almost everywhere. In fact, not far from us is a stork village that is a breeding place for storks, where they return every year to birth and raise their young. We often see storks out in the polder...or on special nests on top of houses/chimneys. The Dutch make sure they keep the storks alive, building nesting stands for them. I love it!

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  2. This is a part of the world I have never been to. Thanks for these photos that allowed me to "visit" a place totally unknown to me.

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  3. very cool ruins, think I'd just bask in the general history of the area.

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  4. Fantastic shots of the ruins.

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  5. Oh my! Morocco is just amazing! Your photos just make me want to visit it as soon as possible!

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  6. Very beautiful images, interesting views!

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  7. Quite incredible, and makes my head spin thinking about how old these ruins are with so much history! Great photos.

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  8. Beautiful ancient ruins -- my post this week is about storks too -- but I only had to drive a few miles to see them (different kind of stork I imagine -- I look forward to seeing yours).

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  9. Wow - the architecture is magnificent!

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  10. Hi! Very nice photos from your trip. Thanks for sharing.

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  11. Very impressive - such a history there.

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  12. Great photos and interesting history! Thank you for sharing

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  13. What a place. Hard to imagine building all that without machinery. I love the geometric designs.

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