On a clear March morning the High Atlas still shows snow on its ridges behind Marrakesh, which impresses even the most screen-loyal ten-year-old. Down in the city, afternoons reach around 23°C, comfortable walking weather for small legs, and that makes March one of the easier months to bring children. Nights are another matter. Lows around 9°C feel sharper in a riad built around an open courtyard, so pack fleeces for the evenings and warm socks for the tiled floors.
Split each day. Do the busy things in the morning and keep the afternoon for a pool or a nap. The souks are what most parents worry about, and fairly so: the lanes are narrow and motorbikes squeeze through them. Leave the pushchair at the riad in favour of a back carrier, and walk with children on the inside, yourself between them and the traffic.
Jardin Majorelle is the famous garden, all cobalt walls and cacti, and compact enough that nobody's legs give out. Tickets are sold only online, for timed slots, so book before you fly. For somewhere to actually run about, the Cyber Park, a few hundred metres from Jemaa el-Fnaa, has lawns and fountains, and clean toilets, which is not a small thing. In the medina, Le Jardin Secret is calmer, and older children can climb its tower for a view across the rooftops. The Menara Gardens are the postcard, a long basin with the Atlas behind, but children soon run out of things to do there.
Older children tend to love Jemaa el-Fnaa at dusk, with its food stalls and its din. Toddlers can find the crush too much, so watch from a rooftop café above the square instead. Walk past the monkey handlers and snake charmers. The Barbary macaques on chains belong to an endangered species, and welfare groups including Born Free have documented how they are kept. Paying for a photo keeps that trade going.
The snow makes March a good month for a day in the mountains. Imlil, at the foot of Toubkal, is about an hour and a half's drive away and noticeably colder, so bring coats. The Ourika Valley is gentler, with riverside cafés and a scramble up to the Setti Fatma waterfalls that suits older children in decent shoes far better than toddlers. Closer in, the stony Agafay desert, under an hour away, does camel rides at sunset with the mountains in view, and it turns cold quickly once the sun has gone.
Ramadan moves about eleven days earlier each year, and in years when it falls in March many local restaurants stay shut until sunset, though hotels and tourist restaurants keep serving. If you have keen swimmers, check the calendar for Oasiria too. The city's big water park usually opens for the season only on the last Friday of March. Before that just its heated pool is open, so a family arriving mid-month will find the slides still closed.