I played it in 2019 and was a little disappointed. On the plus side, it's a mountain course that's walkable--that's always nice. But it's hard not to wonder if the course could've been better had the land plan not set the clubhouse on the cliff edge. It is an absolutely awesome place to have a glass of wine, but it gets in the way of a routing using that area in a variety of ways versus just hitting it on two parallel runs (as in Ian's pictures). Imagine if Pacific Dunes had a gigantic clubhouse and all its necessary infrastructure where the 4/13 snack bar is--that's the level of interference.
The result is that the course features approximately two memorable holes, and they're the ones in Ian's photos--the par-3 9th and the par-4 18th. Not to say it's a "bad" golf course, it's just I'd call a "miss" in GCA parlance.
I agree with Adam, though. Morocco is a great country. Great people and hospitality. The journey from Morocco's main cities into the Atlas range to see a town like Ifrane and a course like Michlifen is so worthwhile in its own right. On the way you can stop and see the Roman ruins at Volubilis, near the modern city of Meknes. Fascinating place.
Volubilis is cool. My favourite place in Morocco is Fes. The ancient medina of Fes is the largest car-free urban area on earth, and it is a total assault on the senses. The Karaouine mosque and madrassa, now a public university, dates from 857. I was once in a cab going from the railway station to the edge of the medina in Fes, and the cabbie asked me where I was from. I told him I lived in Oxford. 'Ah', he said, 'a very famous old university'. I replied in the affirmative. 'Ours is older!' he said gleefully. Fes has a couple of golf courses, though tbh they aren't much to write home about. The best golf in Morocco that I have seen is the Royal Golf Daressalaam in the capital, Rabat, built by RTJ Sr for King Hassan II, and renovated a few years ago by longtime Coore and Crenshaw associate James Duncan. I haven't seen the course in the grounds of the royal palace in Agadir, built by Cabell Robinson for RTJ, which Mr Dunne has -- you need a personal invite from Prince Moulay Rachid, the head man of golf in Morocco --
, but Tom says that in his opinion, it is definitely a world top 100 course. Elsewhere in Agadir, Kyle Philips's Tagazhout course is super.
Moroccan hospitality is the best in the world. You eat in a traditional Moroccan restaurant or riad and you will find it hard to walk afterwards, there is so much food. I was once a guest at the black tie banquet hosted by the Prince, to celebrate the week of the Trophee Hassan II. Several of the guests at my table were American, and had not experienced a Moroccan formal dinner before. The traditional seven vegetable salads were served to open the meal. They were followed by mechoui (whole slow roasted sheep), whole grilled fish, pastilla (a quite delicious pastry made with chicken, or properly, pigeon, a chicken tagine and a meat tagine. It was at this point several of the guests started to flag. I had to tell them (having read the menu, which was in French) that there would be a LARGE couscous with veal to follow, before a parade of desserts. My ex-wife and I once stayed in a riad in Fes. We ate there one night, and there was so much food that we had to sneak the desserts away from the table, take them to our room, and flush them down the toilet as we were too embarrassed to leave them untouched and too full even to consider eating them.