Agadir: the hilltop kasbah and the seafront

At the top of the hill that dominates the bay, only the earth walls of the Kasbah Agadir Oufella, destroyed by earthquake, remain: an inscription in Arabic still reads 'Fear God, Respect the King', visible from much of the city below.

Descending to the port you reach the Marina of Agadir, a neighborhood built in the two-thousands with shops, restaurants and fishing and leisure boats side by side.

A short distance away, the Souk El Had, one of the largest covered markets in Morocco after Marrakech's, encloses over a thousand stalls of spices, fabrics and handicrafts behind its own walls.

Toward evening, the long city beach and the small Valley of the Birds, a garden with birds and small animals in the heart of the city, offer a more peaceful break before dinner.

The crumbling kasbah walls remain lit each evening, transforming the scar left by the earthquake into one of the city's most photographed viewpoints.

In Agadir there is virtually no "old city" to visit: the reconstruction has made the present, more than the past, the true center of the tourist experience.