Tangier travel guide

Perhaps the oldest city in Morocco, Tangier was active as early as 1600 BC. There was a Phoenician settlement here. Roman mythology ascribes its founding to the Greek giant Antaeus, son of Poseidon, god of the Earth, and Gaia, goddess of the earth. Antaeus challenged Hercules, but the hero killed the giant and had a child by his widow, Tingis. Hercules pulled apart Spain and Africa to give this son, Sophax, a city protected by the sea. Then, out of filial piety, King Sophax named his city Tingis.

Thanks to its location on the Straits of Gibraltar, Tangier has always been important. At one point, Rome made it capital of the empire’s North African provinces, its people receiving Roman citizenship in AD 38. It controlled the city until AD 429. Later, the Vandals and Byzantines struggled to control the region, then the Muslim Arabs took the city in AD 706. It remained a point of conflict between major Arab and Berber dynasties before achieving commercial importance in the Mediterranean during the 1300s.

Tangier was first conquered by the Portuguese in 1437, and subsequently reoccupied in 1471, became Spanish in 1578 and Portuguese again in 1640. They built fine houses, Dominican and Franciscan chapels and a cathedral and the city was part of the dowry brought by the Portuguese Catherine of Braganza when she married Charles II of England in 1661. The English succeeded in alienating the Portuguese population, forcing both religious orders and Jews out of the city, before finally departing themselves in 1684, destroying the kasbah as they left. Sultan Moulay Ismaïl rebuilt the town after they left.

In the 19th century Tangier became a popular base for European merchants and housed a large European colony. It was also the focus of political competition between expansionist European powers. In 1923 the city became a tax-free International Zone controlled by a 30-member international committee. From then until the early 1960s Tangier had its heyday – a hedonistic, decadent freeport and playground of an international demi-monde – thus reinforcing the truth of earlier descriptions of the city. St Francis had seen it as a centre of sin, while in the 17th century Samuel Pepys had described it as a latter-day Sodom.

Celebrity visitors

The streets of Tangier are full of artistic and literary memory. Among its illustrious visitors (other than Pepys and St Francis) are Camille Saint-Saëns (who drew on Issaoua trance music for his Danse macabre), film stars Marlene Dietrich and Errol Flynn, Oscar Wilde, author-translator Paul Bowles, Ian Fleming, Richard Hughes (High Wind in Jamaica) and James Leo Herlihy (Midnight Cowboy). Woolworth-heiress Barbara Hutton had a house here, as did the heiress to the Knoll furniture fortune, the crumbling York Castle, up in the kasbah. Winston Churchill, Ronnie Kray, and the photographer Cecil Beaton all passed through. Painters who discovered light and the Orient in Tangier include Eugène Delacroix in 1832, Henri Matisse (1912), Kees Van Dongen and more recently Francis Bacon. The city’s reputation as a haven of freedom for the likes of Tennessee Williams, Truman Capote, William Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, Brion Gysin and Joe Orton in the 1950s and 1960s continues to draw visitors. Today backpackers relive something of those heady days by visiting the Tanger Inn, Rue Magellan , a surviving fragment of Burroughs’ Interzone .

Though many of the city’s literary sites were lost in the demolition-rebuilding of the 1990s, the romantic-minded can still find something of Tangier’s artistic soul. There are plenty of decaying apartment buildings, restaurants and low-life bars. The Grand-Hôtel Villa de France still survives, home to Gertrude Stein and Matisse, as does the Teatro Cervantes. Down near the port, next to the Hôtel Cecil (a favourite with Roland Barthes), is the Immeuble Renschaussen, where Burroughs and Gysin did artistic cut-ups in one of the lofts. Up at the kasbah, the Palais Menebhi was home to Gysin’s 1001 Nights bar. Further west on the Montagne at the Villa Mimosa, Bowles finished Let it Come Down, another tale of an American adrift in the mysterious East. West of the city, the Plage Merkala was the setting for tales by M’rabet, Charhadi and other members of Bowles’ coterie. And the heavily revamped Salon de thé Porte still carries a hint of a literary yesteryear.

The end of cosmopolitan Tangier

Tangier as a centre of easy money and loose morals was not to last, however, and the freeport was reunited with Morocco in October 1956 although its tax-free status was maintained until 1960. Since Independence, Tangier has declined in international economic importance and its tourism was soon overshadowed by the enormous development of the industry elsewhere in the Mediterranean. Today the city functions essentially for the Moroccan tourist and travel market. In the summer, up to two million migrant workers and their families pass through the port, and Tangier is their first contact with their homeland. In the 1980s, the green cliff tops of La Montagne, west of the city, came to be favoured by Gulf amirs as the ideal place for a holiday home. Soon, vast palaces in the neo-Kuwaiti style appeared like UFOs in the pine and eucalyptus woods around the city.

Contemporary Tangier

Tangier has always been through highs and lows, and the 1990s were in many ways the trough of a low period. A building boom, in part financed by the profits of the kif trade, meant masses of new development as profits were recycled in. Many historic buildings were torn down, replaced by blocks of concrete-brutalist ugliness. And then came the late king’s ‘clean up public life’ campaign. Corruption scandals and court cases hit the city, various local figures disappeared behind bars or overseas, all to the good many would say. But the big change came with Mohammed VI’s accession to the throne in July 1999. The new king made the Northwest the first region he visited outside the capital. Tangier was ecstatic. The long-ignored Palais Marshan was dusted down, there seemed to be some hope for a region too long forgotten by the powers that be.

A feisty local press have kept things moving along, associations have been set up to do something for street kids, to support the unemployed and illiterate, to save the kasbah and the Teatro Cervantes. A new port is being constructed, the A1 motorway link to Rabat completed, and an intellectual design set, tired of crowded and touristy Marrakech, have rediscovered the virtues of Tangier. The general environment has improved too, with new management for city services and an awareness that not everything old should be pulled down. Tangier’s attraction for other creatives has also remained intact, the Cinema Rif on the Grand Socco having been renovated and reborn as the Cinémathèque de Tangier, an important centre for the arts in the heart of the city.

The future of Tangier

With a population that has quadrupled from 250,000 in 1982 to a million, Tangier continues to sprawl ever further inland, its growth fuelled by rural in-migration and high unemployment. In times of pressure, the frustration of the deprived spills over in riots in the poor areas on the city edge. But things are better than they were and many of the bidonville inhabitants are being rehoused. Work is expected to start soon on a rail tunnel between Spain and Morocco, though it is unlikely to be completed before 2025, and the city’s future development will certainly be interesting to watch as Morocco moves closer to the European Union. The new royal interest is a very positive sign.

With its special history, Tangier is an endearing place, a town of past cosmopolitan glories. Some say it is best remembered from a vantage point, perhaps a cliff-top café, overlooking the Straits and the distant Iberian coast across the choppy sea, but no doubt it will remain a place of legend. As Mohammed Choukri put it, “In Tangier, any capable storyteller can invent a story and be sure to convince listeners of its truth.”.

Banks

All the usual banks with ATMs are on Blvd Pasteur/Av Mohammed V. The Crédit du Maroc, on the ground floor of the Tanja Flandria Hotel, has a bureau de change, as does the BMCI, down the street opposite the Terrasse des paresseux, next to the Café de France. The Wafa Bank (ATM) is further down the slo pe, on your left just before the PTT. Banks are open 0830-1130 and 1430-1630. American Express: c/o Voyages Schwartz, 54 Blvd Pasteur, T039-933459, open Mon-Fri 0900-1230, 1500-1900, Sat 0900-1230.

Plenty of internet places around town for about 10dh per hr. Try Cyber Pasteur, 61 Bld Pasteur, or Fun Clic, 66 Bld Mohammed V. Library Tangier Book Club, Old American Legation, 8 Rue d’Amerique, the médina, T039-935317. Open Tue-Sat 0900-1200.

Medical services

Ambulance: T15. Chemists: Pharmacie de Garde, 26 Rue de Fès, T039-932616. Hospital: Emergencies: T039-930856, also try T039-934242.

Post

PTT, 33 Av Mohammed V, T039-935657, Mon-Fri 0830-1200, 1430-1800, Sat 0830-1200.

Telephone

International phone (24 hrs) far right of post office. Also telephone from the PTT at the junction of Rue el Msala and Rue de Belgique. There are also the usual téléboutiques.

Useful addresses

Fire: T15.
Garage: Tanjah Auto, 2 Av de Rabat.
Police: (general) Rue Ibn Toumert, T19; (traffic) T177.

Tangier is quite a small place but the bus station (mahattat el kirane) is a good way out. You will need to get a petit taxi (12dh), which ought to be metered, or a grand taxi. A trip within the city by petit taxi is 10dh. Taxis can be flagged down even when they have other passengers. If it is going in your direction, it will take you. A grand taxi ride will cost 10dh for a trip within the city. Prices go up by 50% after 2000. There are handy Boughaz minibuses and grands taxis from the Grand Socco to the bus station and the Atlantic coast sights.

Tangier’s Ibn Batouta Airport, T039-393720, is 15 km southwest of the city on the N1 road to Rabat. Entry formalities can be slow. Catch bus 17 or 70 from the terminal to the Grand Socco (Place du 19 Avril 1947), or take a grand taxi (160dh by day, 200dh after 2000, rates displayed on wall by customs).

The train no longer stops at Tangier Ville and Port. Rather, the terminal is at Tangier Moghougha, a 15dh petit taxi ride from the town centre, 20dh for the port, more at night. Have change ready. Taxi drivers will want to fill up their vehicles so you may have to wait.

CTM buses arrive at the terminal in Avenue des FAR, adjacent to the port gates, and the former Tangier Ville railway station. Private lines arrive at the terminal at the end of Rue de Fès. There are plenty of buses to Tangier, from Casablanca, Fès, Meknès and Rabat, as well as from local places like Asilah, Larache and Tetouan. The bus station is a short (12dh) petit taxi ride from the city centre hotels.

If you are driving into the city in the summer from the south, expect slow traffic north of Asilah after the motorway ends. The A1 from Rabat brings the driver into Tangier along Rue de Fès. The N16 from Ceuta feeds into Av Mohammed V, as does the N2 from Tetouan.

There are car/passenger ferry services from Algeciras in Spain and Gibraltar. Within the port compound, there is a rank for both kinds of taxi. Hard negotiation over prices will be probably be necessary.

Tangier

Air

Tangier’s Ibn Batouta Airport, T039-393720, is 15 km southwest of the city on the N1 road to Rabat. Catch bus 17 or 70 from Grand Socco or a grand taxi. Arrive 1-2 hrs early. EasyJet (http://www.easyjet.com) fly here from Madrid and Atlas Blue (http://www.atlas-blue.com) fly from London Heathrow. There are also direct flights to other European cities including: Amsterdam, Barcelona, Brussels, Frankfurt and Paris.

Internal direct flights to: Agadir, Al Hoceïma and Casablanca.

Airline offices

: Air France, 20 Blvd Pasteur. British Airways, 83 Rue de la Liberté, T039- 935877. Iberia, 35 Blvd Pasteur, T039-936177. Royal Air Maroc, Pl de France, T039-935501/2.

Boat

At the port avoid all touts selling embarkation cards – these are free from the officials.

Ferry tickets to Algeciras can be bought at travel agents in Blvd Pasteur, or at the ferry terminal. Trasmediterranea (http://www.trasmediterranea.es) run a car and passenger service about 10 times a day on high speed (1 hr) and standard ferries (2½ hrs). Passengers from E42, cars from E160. Check in at least 1 hr early, to allow time to collect an embarkation card, complete a departure card, and have your passport stamped.

There are departures every 2 hrs from Tangier to Tarifa with FRS (http://www.frs.es), a mere 35-min journey. Passengers E39, car E99, with a free bus transfer to Algeciras.

Tickets to Sete, in the South of France, can be bought from Voyages Comanav, 43 Rue Abou el Alaâ el Maâri, T039-934096, http://www.comanav.ma. There is a ferry every 2-4 days. Passenger tickets from E40. Car and 2 passengers from E205.

There are also less frequent ferry services to Gibraltar, and Genoa.

Bus

Bus station on Av Jami’ al Duwal al Arabia, T039-946682, information, T039-932415. Tangier is fairly small and thus it is unlikely that you will want to use local buses. If you do they can be picked up in the Grand Socco or in Av des FAR outside the port gates. Boughaz minibuses, from just outside the port gate, may be useful to get to the private bus station, or on excursions from Tangier westwards.

CTM buses depart from the ticket office near the entrance to the port in Av des FAR. Departures include: Kénitra, Rabat and Casablanca; Larache and Asilah; Meknès and Fès; Agadir and Tiznit.

Private buses, running from the terminal at the end of Rue de Fès, go to most destinations and are generally cheaper. Tetouan every 15 mins (1 hr); Asilah 3 daily (30 mins); Larache every hour (1½ hrs); Meknès 4 daily (5 hrs); Fès 2 daily (6 hrs); Chefchaouen 6 daily (2½ hrs); Ceuta 3 daily (2 hrs); Ouezzane 0900, 1400 (4 hrs). To get to the terminal take a petit taxi.

Car hire

Avis, 54 Blvd Pasteur, T039-938960, and at the airport. Budget, 7 Av du Prince Moulay Abdallah, T039-937994, and at the airport. Europcar, 87 Av Mohammed V, T039-938271. Hertz, 36 Av Mohammed V, T039-933322, and at the airport. Leasing Cars, 24 Rue Henri Regnault, and at the airport, a little cheaper.

Taxi

Grands taxis

Can be picked up from the Gare du Routier or in front of Tangier Ville railway station, to destinations within or outside of the city. You will need to set a fare with the driver. To Tetouan and Ceuta this is a quick, practical and not too expensive option. For excursions from Tangier to the Caves of Hercules or Cap Malabata negotiate for a grand taxi in Rue de Hollande.

Petits taxis

Turquoise with yellow stripe, may be cheaper, although that will depend on your skill as the meters are not always operated. For a taxi, call T039-935517.

Train

Information T090 20 30 40. The former port station on Av des FAR is firmly closed. Trains now arrive/depart from the suburban Moughougha station, a 20dh taxi ride out in the new suburbs. Departure times change: in general there are 3-4 a day, including a 2230 overnight train with couchettes for Marrakech. Other departures include: Rabat, Casablanca and Marrakech. Meknès, Fès and Oujda can be reached by making a connection at Sidi Kacem. All trains stop at Asilah.