Tales of Morocco: Merzouga.

Of course we were apprehensive about leaving Fes! After all, there were accessible malls and decent wifi, plus the whole idea of venturing into the Sahara and staying overnight alongside scorpions, snakes and scarabs was a bit daunting. On the journey there, we drove past many rocky and sandy landscapes and it made me realize how dry and barren Morocco is. Except for, perhaps, our brief respite at Ifrane which was surprisingly much cooler and filled with Alpine-style houses. After a helluva long drive South-East, 7 hours & 19 minutes according to Google, we arrived in a cute little desert town called Merzouga.

A random school we drove past en route to Merzouga.

We chose our auberge (French for an inn) based on a blog review and was pleasantly surprised. The place was called Auberge le Petit Prince managed by brothers Zaïd and Hassan, the cost for a double room was around €60 per night. It had air conditioning, hot (and cold) water and quite a good breakfast. Zaïd was extremely hospitable and he had a rather chill attitude which may seem strange to city folks like us, I remember he poured us some mint tea and quietly sat down before going silent for a good 45 seconds as if pondering something - on hindsight I think he was allowing us time to soak in the whole pre-desert experience.

Because of its isolated location, all our meals were had in the auberge - they charged additional for each meal but the price was more than reasonable and the brothers served up generous portions enough to induce a food coma. The fatigue from the long drive from Fes was also getting to us and after our dinner we crashed pretty quick. We woke up pretty early next morning and headed straight to the alfresco breakfast corner, a shared space between guests and those who just returned from the desert tour.

Speaking of desert tours, that was our whole purpose of venturing all the way out here in Merzouga. We booked ours through Zaïd for €30 per person, which included a camel ride into the Sahara, overnight tent stay with proper beds and dinner. Since we weren't departing till about 5pm, we took a half-day tour with a driver who brought us to a few places: a small village where Gnawa “band” called Pigeons du Sable played for tourists (apparently they have CDs too,) followed by a quick stop at an abandoned quartz mine before wrapping up at the nearby nomads' tents.

The entrance to the Pigeons of the Sand band performance.

Fossils used to fill the land but most of them were removed for “commercial purposes” by locals.

The little nomadic boy, Hassan, who was so adorable!

Shortly after our return to the auberge, our desert guide (affectionately addressed as Ali Baba) called for us while preparing our camels. Sure, I've taken camel rides in Dubai and Cairo but none of them lasted more than 15 minutes. Ali Baba told us that the ride into the Sahara was around 2 hours... one way. Before we could react, there was a strong jolt and our camels were up and ready to move. Let me say, the Moroccan sun at 5pm was merciless but the view was absolutely worth it when we rode further into the desert, the dunes just went on and on...

After what seemed like forever, we arrived at our humble camp area right before the last minutes of sunlight. There were about five tents surrounding a couple of tables and Ali Baba said we each had a tent to ourselves, but of course we opted to crash in one (not the greatest idea as it was not ventilated!) There wasn't much to unpack as were were forced to travel “light”, we just roamed around the camp and waited for our dinner which took 2 hours to prepare. Yes, you'd have to deal with the glacial pace of Moroccan life. One of the guides prepared some whiskey berber, which was a fancier name for Moroccan mint tea and we all agreed it was the best we had so far. Oh, following dinner was some “live jamming” where we were also egged on to participate.

What we were looking forward to most was the sunrise next morning, Ali Baba woke us up like most parents would and dragged us to a spot facing the Algerian border where the sun was slowly peeking over the horizon. Holy f*ck. What. A. Sight. There were no words, really, to describe it but I suddenly felt so small. It was a truly humbling experience. Of course, we had to take some OOTD shots before returning to our auberge where our breakfast awaited. We'd probably never do this kind of desert tour again in our lives and I was really glad I did it with Daniel and best friends.

If any of you are planning a trip to Morocco, I think Merzouga is not to be missed. After all, it's a mere 8 hours drive from Marrakech :p Next up in our journey was Aït Benhaddou where we stayed in “paradise” and witnessed the beautiful Milky Way.

x