Monday, January 9, 2017

Morocco - the Sahara

Driving through this part of the desert we came across these small hills which had been dug up centuries ago to access the miles of tunnels below which brought water from the mountains to the villages.  The second photo shows the well access.



 And below are the attempts to control the movement of the sand onto the road
 Our first glimpse of the dunes!  if you open the picture you will see the village on the right which gives a perspective of how high they are.





Starting out on our camel ride in the late afternoon to catch the sunset.  We were well wrapped with burnooses to keep our heads warm but there was no wind so no blowing sand.  Shades of Lawrence of Arabia!!


 our tent for the night.  It was below 0C overnight and we had so many blankets on (we were lying on a thin mattress on carpet on the ground) that I could hardly move.  But after before that we had a lovely tagine dinner, sat around a campfire with other guests and enjoyed the most amazing spectacle of stars. 

Rob and Rebecca on top of a dune
The ride back to catch the sunset - all before breakfast!. 






 The ride ended at a very nice hotel where a room was waiting for us to shower and change and then on to a breakfast buffet on a terrace overlooking the dunes. 


1 comment:

Heather Dubreuil said...

Your photos have shown me the beauty and variety that Morocco offers the traveler. So often people say the value of going on a cruise is that you can sample various stops and then decide whether or not to return. Our one-day port-of-call in Casablanca was so truly awful that we would never have considered going back. Even the tour guide admitted it was one of her least favourite destinations, and called it an "armpit". I believe it was undergoing a lot of infrastructure repair and expansion at the time, four or five years ago. These posts on Morocco have certainly challenged my first impression of the country.