I’m watching you, child. Your Majesty, that is.
In the actual Casablanca, not the well regarded 1942 Oscar-winning film, I soaked like a queen in a warm bath strewn with rose petals at the opulent Art Deco Royal Mansour hotel, which was owned by, uh, King Mohammed VI of Morocco.
I saw apricot skies wrap a far-off iconic mosque while I nobly devoured a complimentary inch-tall M-shaped chocolate imprinted with Royal Mansour earlier in my same royal suite. The 24-story hotel’s interior was lavishly decorated with 70 varieties of polished marble, and the air (along with free SPF 15 hand cream and provided pashmina shawls) smelled of the famous Royal Mansour fragrance, fleur d’ orange, which was also a favorite of another monarch, Louis XIV.
from the five-star resort was anything from stuck-up. Everybody, from the general manager to the numerous uniformed doormen (the bellhop looked amazing in a vintage cherry-red dress), always put one hand to their chest as a sign of goodwill while grinning broadly and calling each visitor by name. Although there were 600 Bohemian crystal fish spinning from the vaulted ceiling of the gilded lobby, I always felt as though I was entering a super-classy Cheers when I got out of the hotel’s chauffeured electric Mercedes-Benz to a greeting chorus.
I was only the first member of the aristocracy to stay there. Following Casablanca, I took a train to the coast of this Islamic country in North Africa, where I saw the Royal Mansour Tamuda Bay, which is also owned by Morocco’s crowned king and is located near to his fortified, spacious summer residence. I left my beachside resort to explore the winding streets of two ancient medinas, including the UNESCO-listed Tetouan, where butchers cut the necks of live chickens and customers in modern tunics browsed piles of vegetables.
Last year, Morocco’s 61-year-old monarch unveiled two of my zellige-tiled Royal Mansour accommodations with the claimed goal of increasing tourism. Although the billionaire has a sizable personal business empire, the magnificent Royal Mansour Marrakech, his only other hotel, opened its doors in 2010. (In Arabic, “mansour” signifies “victory.) Regarding the nation, King Mohammed VI has vast power yet co-rules with an elected legislature.
According to my Casablanca guide, Naima Boussaid, he is referred to as the King of the Poor. People adore him because he works hard to support education, single mothers, and the poor.
Naima, a dynamic Muslim mother of two grown daughters, wore a red baseball cap with the words Morocco emblazoned on it, a rainbow-toned long djellaba, a heavy Hand of Fatima silver pendant that wards off evil eyes, and lime green hightop Converse (I have all the colors). We took a tour of the enormous, elaborate Hassan II Mosque, which was finished in 1993 and built by the late father of the king. Naima said with amazement that 5,000 artisans worked on it around the clock for six years in three daily shifts. A laser that beams 18 miles over the Atlantic towards Mecca and helps ships in the dark atop the 60-story minaret—the second-tallest in the world.
Before the day was done, Naima had shown me how to do a thorough scrub with gooey black soap in a hammam, brought me to buy the Moroccan 35-spice combination called Ras el Hanout, and gave me her secret recipe for tagine stew. Additionally, she complemented a stranger in Arabic in the more recent whitewashed medina, and he quickly invited us to relax among the typical mounds of lovely pillows wrapped in colorful textiles in his traditional family house. (Moroccans are quite welcoming.)
Do you know what makes Casablanca so well-known? Later, Naima inquired about Morocco’s bustling financial center. The film. Despite the fact that it was all shot in Hollywood. She laughed. With the exception of one sequence shot at the nearby Van Nuys Airport, Casablanca was filmed entirely on a Warner Bros. backlot in Burbank.
Naturally, I had to go to Rick’s Cafe in Casablanca. It was established in 2004 by an American woman who loved the romantic drama starring Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman and had previously worked as a counselor for the U.S. Embassy in Morocco. A stern-suited doorman with blue-mirrored spectacles was talking to someone on his two-way earphone radio when I arrived at Rick’s early in the afternoon. After that, I was shown to an upstairs nook of the movie-loving eatery. A antique roulette table occupied the middle of this comfortable space, nostalgic posters of Bogie and Bergman graced the walls, and the black-and-white Casablanca played on a screen. Before a kind waiter in a red fez hat showed up to accept my order of chardonnay, I had the entire place to myself, including the three barstools.
(Note that since alcohol consumption is prohibited in Islam, only specific licensed establishments—mostly hotels and tourist restaurants—are permitted to serve alcohol.)
If you’re tired of relaxing in the hotel spa while surrounded by crimson gold saffron that was picked from the Moroccan hinterlands or being mesmerized by the lobby’s aquarium-terrarium that houses more than 1,000 darting fish from the Amazon and Asia, the Royal Mansour offers a variety of carefully planned excursions. The accommodation rates, which start at $590 and include a full breakfast with round pats of butter adorned with the Royal Mansour’s M logo—which also looks like a crenellated casbah gate—are surprisingly affordable.
In addition to my tour with Naima, the concierge organized a trip to see over 30 vibrant street art murals across the city with a really fantastic dreadlocked organization representative. If you hear people speaking both French and Arabic, it’s because the king’s grandfather, Mohammed V, battled for Morocco’s independence in 1956 after more than 40 years as a French protectorate. By the way, the current King Mohammed VI, who came to power in 1999 and has a doctorate in law, was the first Moroccan monarch to publicly introduce his princess wife and highlight her humanitarian endeavors. The couple got divorced in 2018 and has two grown children.
The 23rd-floor Mediterranean restaurant Le Rooftop, Royal Mansour’s piece de resistance, captivated me that evening. On the wrap-around panoramic outdoor deck, I savored a black truffle, mushroom, and asparagus polenta while feasting on a blazing neon sunset that transformed the sprawling, legendary White City below. Meanwhile, at the 1950s-inspired cocktail lounge on the ground floor, a bartender created large Royal Mansour M-shaped ice cubes for nightcaps.
In every town, among all the gin establishments
Donkey carts pushed their way through narrow alleys filled with native Berber women selling Jben cheese wrapped in palm leaves, fishmongers peddling slick sardines, and cages full of live, squawking birds in the bustling medieval Tetouan medina. After the locals chose their feathered meal, the animal’s throat was cut and its body was removed.
According to my guide, Nuri Abdelkhalek, they don’t get any fresher than that. Tetouan’s walled UNESCO World Heritage Site is, in fact, the most genuine.
Back at my king’s Royal Mansour Tamuda Bay, visitors favored nibbling on amlou pastries shaped like flowers and covered in edible gold, as well as beluga sturgeon caviar. We were on the Moroccan Riviera, after all.
I took a two-hour high-speed train from Casablanca to Tangier, which is located on the Strait of Gibraltar, to reach this north shore. My fascinating seatmate informed me that he was an imam who led prayers at a mosque in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, and that he made a courteous attempt to convert me to Islam throughout the better part of the journey. He later sent me 710 pages of the Quran via WhatsApp, notwithstanding his failure.
I was greeted at the Tangier station by a driver from Royal Mansour, and after a smooth 90-minute trip, I was shell-shocked as I entered the Tamuda Bay lobby. 95,000 seashells, purportedly hand-picked from the shore in front, were used to create the patterned walls. The secluded half-mile stretch of beach was practically covered—in fact, layered—with shells washed up from the azure Alboran Sea, which made me question about the origin claim. To make walking easier, workers swept the area. (The pool bar, lights, and artwork are all made of shells, carrying on the nautical theme.)
The main entrance features a portrait of the beloved king, who has long taken vacations in his security-patrolled property next door. The Royal Mansour, which is spread across 25 lush acres and is made up of individual low-key, tan-colored blocky buildings, has 55 excellent modern suites and villas, three restaurants run by Michelin-starred chefs, and a complex system of underground tunnels for staff, including butlers, to scuttle through. I’ve been told that his extended family and VIP friends have stayed there. (Rooms from $682 include breakfast. Reserve the hotel’s 18,000-square-foot Royal Villa, which costs $27,000 per night and has a movie theater and a white Steinway baby grand.)
Zaid Habssaid, a local hiking enthusiast who went on a trip with me across the neighboring mountains, had, “We always see the king jet-skiing and sailing his black boat.” Zaid was referring to the king’s 230-foot, $100 million yacht, Baldi 1.
Although I had visited Morocco twice previously, I had never traveled to this region, which is typically off the map for international tourists. Just 20 minutes from Tamuda Bay, the Andalusian-inspired labyrinth maze of Tetouan served as a haven for Muslims and Jews fleeing the Spanish Inquisition during the 15th century. According to Nuri, my hotel-provided guide, only a few Jewish families now live among their Muslim neighbors in the mellah sections that formerly protected thousands of Sephardic Jews. (For more than 40 years, until 1956, Tetouan was the capital of the Spanish protectorate in northern Morocco; you may encounter street signs in Hebrew, Arabic, and Spanish.)
Nuri once paused at a sign indicating a communal oven constructed in the 1800s for Jews to bake matzoh or bread. The welcoming Muslim proprietor insisted on giving me a handful of warm cashews and roasted almonds to sell. Shopkeeper Barrack Abderazeke urged, “Come in,” down another tiny passageway. Everyone is loved by us. We are a single, large family. Then, without being asked, he unfolded fifteen enormous, vibrant Moroccan Berber rugs, some of which were made from camel hair.
On a different day, Nuri took me on a tour of Tangier, showing me the city’s centuries-old, vibrant medina and its casbah stronghold, as well as the Atlantic and Mediterranean Seas’ meeting point and Africa’s first pet cemetery. Souk vendors advertised everything from bejeweled caftans to beldi olives and argan oil behind the stone ramparts.
When I returned to the Royal Mansour Tamuda Bay, I lathered up like a queen once more. The hotel’s serene, dimly lighted heavenly indoor silent pool was the only place I was by myself this evening. My body was immersed in a magnificent galaxy as a huge, hanging orb that resembled the moon faintly shined overhead and magically mirrored sparkly stars on surface waters all around me.
For the time being, this was my realm.
