Through the desert

(Sorry for the delay, we’ve been away from internet for a while…)

Our next day of driving took us through the desert towards Erg Chigaga – a 40km stretch of towering sand dunes in the Sahara. We had originally planned to visit Erg Chebbi, a beautiful and more accessible collection of Saharan dunes, but also much more visited. So we were excited to get to visit this remote place, tucked near the border to Algeria.

(We actually drove through about 5 different kinds of deserts, all slightly different – josh)

After many hours of bone rattling driving, we stopped in the black desert for a look at fossils amongst the rocks, and started seeing more sand appearing in the rocky landscape.

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As sunset approached, our normally sensible driver Mohammed started to drive like a crazy man to get us to the dunes in time. The 4WD screeched to a halt and we all jumped out and started running up to the highest dune so we could be at the top as the sun started to dip. Okay, the running didn’t last long because those dunes were very steep…

The view from the top was worth the shortness of breath… it really did look like a huge ocean of sand stretching out around us. It was definitely one of my favourite places here.

 

We’d been expecting a camping set-up for our overnight stay, with maybe a drop toilet if we were lucky. But we made our way back down the sand dunes in the dark (trusting Josh not to lead me off the edge of a dune) and found private mud brick huts with actual beds, a carpeted lounging area, restaurant tent and toilet and shower block with hot water and flush toilets.

It was actually nicer (and warmer) than most of the guesthouses we’ve stayed in… And had much cooler neighbours.

We ate our chicken tagine for dinner, fed the scraps to the camp cat and set our alarm to get up before sunrise. It was freezing trekking across the dunes in the dark the next morning but amazing sitting up the top by ourselves as the sun made its way up.

Well, there was one guy sitting in our vicinity meditating, but he certainly didn’t ruin the silence like the large group of Moroccan men at sunset who were talking and praying at the top of their lungs – usually at least three of them talking at once. Obviously they were very excited to see Erg Chigaga too.

After breakfast we drove back out of the desert and stopped briefly in one of those towns that Lonely Planet tries to be optimistic about but could be more easily summarised as “giant scumhole but okay for a toilet break if you have to”. We continued on through the desolate Draa Valley, which is dotted with oases and crumbling ancient kasbahs. We got to explore one kasbah that a whole community lives in, and were guided through by a local man with the exit conveniently through the pottery shop at the end of the tour.

Our driver put us in a grand taxi for the last hour to Ouarzazate while he took the road back to Tafraoute….we missed him straight away as our taxi driver drove like a maniac around the winding mountain roads and overtook on blind corners. Our hotel “in” Ouarzazate turned out to be nowhere near the actual city but we were just grateful for hot water and a bed after a long day driving.