Marokko
Er-Rissani

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    • Dag 6

      Workout in the dunes

      15. april 2023, Marokko ⋅ ☀️ 21 °C

      The rooms were nice and cool and everyone slept well.
      For the sunrise it is worth to climb a dune and enjoy the magic moment. It sounds easy, but it's not! A workout of a special kind.

      3 hours time for me!
      After breakfast Lan went with Mustafa and a part of the group further into the desert. There they visited the nomads living there. The other part, i.e. 2 of the men, rented a Quard and ventured with a guide very close to the border to Algeria. At least they saw the Algerian mountains from far away.
      I stayed with Debbie, Björin, Josephine, Sharaia and Paula in the oasis by the pool. 3h just being and doing nothing, before continuing again to the Todra Gorge.
      Les mer

    • Dag 5

      Nightlive

      14. april 2023, Marokko ⋅ 🌙 22 °C

      By the way, who would have thought: we found the best food in the desert. The Berber guys cooked really delicious.
      The night was beautiful. Unlike the desert in Dubai, it got really dark here. The stars were incredibly beautiful. With a glass of wine, it was perfect. It didn't get really cold either, at least to my sensibilities. The 19 degrees at night was pleasant.Les mer

    • Dag 10

      Date farm

      12. mai 2023, Marokko ⋅ ☀️ 34 °C

      After dinner at the camp in the Sahara, we visited a date farm and Oasis that was started in 1985. This guy was super happy, and seemed to really enjoy showing us all of his trees, making us guess at all the almond, pomegranate, avocado trees, and tons of other things. He has one male palm tree and he uses it to fertilize all of his female palm trees which he does by hand for each individual cluster! One male can serve up to 150 females. He climbed straight up in his sandals and bare hands to demonstrate, it was crazy. He irrigates with drip irrigation, that apparently is turned on back at his house, it was cute because he called on his cell phone to have somebody turn it on so he could demonstrate. His alfalfa was beautiful, and I think I'm going to try to grow it when I get back for our horses.Les mer

    • Dag 10

      Sahara dune sunset

      12. mai 2023, Marokko ⋅ ☀️ 33 °C

      After the date farm, our guide drove us deep into the dunes, and we got to hike up a baby dune. The sand is so soft. You had to go really fast or you would sink in, several of us. Had to get on all fours to get to the top. There was a rainstorm off in the distance so that was a cool thing to watch. Very beautiful, fantastic place to watch the sunset! To get down. It was pretty steep so we did a berber sled (?) where three of us locked legs and arms in our guide ran backwards pulling us down. It was hilarious, everyone got sand all up in their shirts and pants. We were so far away from the closest village, yet two little girls ran over to us from I don't know where to sell us some handmade camels. They were very sweet.Les mer

    • Dag 8

      Jour 8 - Liaison Boulajoul ↔Merzouga 🐫

      19. februar, Marokko ⋅ ☀️ 21 °C

      Départ au petit matin, quand le soleil pointe à peine le bout de son nez.
      La liaison jusqu'à Merzouga fut l'une des plus marquantes de cette aventure.
      Nous avons une nouvelle fois traversé des lieux magnifiques avec des panoramas à couper le souffle.

      C'est aussi sur cette épreuve que la 4L a fait son baptême de la piste. Nous avons fait nos premiers kilomètres hors du goudron, sur la roche et le sable, et le moins que l'on puisse dire c'est que ça ne laisse pas indifférent. Entre la poussière, le bruit dans l'habitacle et les plateaux désertiques à perte de vue, nous étions bien loin de nos autoroutes habituelles.
      Les mer

    • Dag 12

      Guten Abend M'Hamid

      26. september 2023, Marokko ⋅ ☀️ 30 °C

      Nach zwei Tagen Wüste, unzähligen Kilometern auf Schotter, Sand und Steinen und einer Nacht im Oasis Camp jetzt endlich wieder Internet und Zivilisation!!!
      Und es war heiß, es war sau heiß und nachts war's wieder heiß...und jetzt ist immernoch heiß... aktuell 32° um 22.59 Uhr!!!
      Aber es hat Spaß gemacht, durch Sanddünen zu cruisen, über kilometerlange feine Schotterpisten zu heizen und die unendlich große Landschaft zu sehen. Wir waren beim Krater von "Spectre", das früher unter den Portugiesen ein Gefängnis war, haben eine heiße Nacht in einer Oase erlebt und sind heute über 130km Offroad durch einen riesigen Meteoritenkrater gefahren...
      Es ist sehr anstrengend aber eine tolle Erfahrung....und morgen Abend gibt's höchstwahrscheinlich wieder kein Netz, das Desert Camp steht ab...eine Nacht mitten in der Wüste auf einer Sanddüne....bin gespannt!
      Les mer

    • Dag 5

      Sahara Desert, Merzouga MoroccoSahara De

      22. september 2023, Marokko ⋅ ☀️ 34 °C

      This trip became another chance to learn the Moroccan lesson of “Trust there is a system”. We were offered a tour out to see the Sahara by our friendly Riad owner Saad. It came about while sitting on the Riad terrace one evening when Saad came up to ask us what we had planned for our stay. We explained that we had an open schedule and no plans so were happy to see what was on offer. He kindly explained that the tour would start with breakfast at a nearby cafe. Then, we would take a drive out to the Sahara. Once there, we would ride camels into the dunes to witness the sunset. Then ride the camels back to a camp in the dunes where dinner, local African drums and dancing would be had around a fire. Hard to resist an experience like that!

      After another day in Fes to explore and relax on our own, we left at 7:30 am to meet our driver. We were picked up by our country and western-loving shuttle driver from a few nights before and drove into the Medina for a typical Moroccan breakfast of baguette, eggs and jam. As we were dropped at the cafe our driver told us we would be going in another car from here and he left. This cafe was obviously the meeting point for a lot of tours as it was full of travellers each being given the same set breakfast menu and a thrive of locals hustling around different tour vans parked up on the kerb.

      After finishing brekkie a guy started asking who was going to Merzouga to which we said we were and we were directed onto a waiting bus. Having been told by Saad that our car would be up to 6 people we already felt like this was going to be another case of the Moroccan lesson. Now in a full bus of about 15 people, we started our 10-hour drive south.

      The surroundings of Fes were immediately a bare arid landscape. But, almost unbelievably, the whole drive so far had been various plantations of apples and olives and stone fruits. Literally paddocks of well-irrigated crops set in barren rocky fields.

      We’d also been told we would stop at a monkey forest along the way which I really couldn’t imagine. Nowhere we’d seen so far looked like a forest and it definitely wasn’t somewhere I’d expect monkeys. My previous experiences with monkeys have been mostly from a distance with shy little Pygmy monkeys in Peru that you only saw occasionally, or loud howling monkeys in Guatemala that were high in the trees of the jungle and you couldn’t even see them. Or the grubby bag-snatching monkeys in Thailand that would chase any unsuspecting tourist that wasn’t watching their gear. In what was an attraction solely for tourists, the “Monkey Forest” was better than expected. We pulled off the side of the road that had a handful of make-shift stalls set up and immediately in a small patch of trees were about 15-20 decent-sized monkeys. Literally just chilling on the ground watching the ridiculous busloads of tourists that stopped by for their 15-minute stop and a photo. As soon as I got off the bus one of the larger ones came straight towards me and was only stopped from climbing my leg when I shooed him away. Kind of shocked why he’d come straight up to me, I realised as I walked off that the rustling of the empty muesli bar wrapper in my pocket had another one heading my way.

      The rest of the bus trip dragged on through the day with us crossing over the Atlas mountain range before eventually arriving to a waiting Hilux. After our stop for lunch we’d expected we were running late so were anxious as to whether we’d make it in time for the sunset over the dunes. Again with no apparent system, the passengers from the bus were separated into different vehicles before heading off in different directions. With Jessie and I sitting on a tray load of luggage, we went off-road to find our camels waiting at the base of the dunes. On our last day in Fes we spent searching the markets for some traditional Moroccan clothes and turbans so now our moment to play the part had arrived. Out the side of the hilux we changed into our possibly culturally-inappropriate robes and off on the camels we went. No more than 15min into the dunes we reached a crest and dismounted to watch the sunset. So apparently the system works 🤷‍♂️.

      Our camel guide hilariously directed us to strike different poses for photos. Then, we got back on the camels and headed to the camp. We arrived at a campsite at the base of the dunes. The campsite had permanent tents and a large communal area. The area was beautifully lit by Moroccan-style lamps with people sitting around enjoying the desert evening. This looked great, and after our day of trusting the system would work we felt relieved that we’d finally made it. We grabbed our tea and found a cushion outside to finally relax and enjoy the serene desert experience. Except before we could even take a sip of tea, a driver called out to us and said we needed to grab our bags. Not what we wanted to hear.

      We were transferred to another camp that was extremely bland by comparison with absolutely no atmosphere and a cold reception. Regardless we still had the dunes right there for us to go explore in the beautiful warm evening air. After dinner (which was at a third camp!), we grabbed a pillow and went out to lay on the crest of a dune. Once the moon had set the stars were incredible. Almost as a sign that our day was complete, a massive shooting star shot straight across the sky in front of us.

      The next day we wandered back into the dunes to enjoy the incredible colour change of the dunes during sunrise. Afterwards, we returned to the camp for another typical Moroccan breakfast of instant coffee, dry croissant, dry roti and dry cake. We had booked into a hotel in the nearby “town” for the next night of our desert trip so after getting a lift in we had the day to ourselves. We had been told the hotel had a pool but as we would come to realise, it was important to keep our expectations low and hope for the best. The Hotel was much better than we expected, especially after being shuffled between three different camps the night before, and the continual change of vehicles that seemed to happen on every trip. The pool, while physically there, wasn’t quite the refreshing oasis we hoped. A stagnant milky brown colour we opted to sit by the side in the shade and take some time to read and snooze before it got too hot. The day got to about 38C which meant there wasn’t much for us to do through the day. We snuck out to stroll through the town's single Main Street to find some lunch and then explored the “Park” that was shown as a 5-star rating on Google Maps. Turns out the park was just a Date-palm plantation but nice to wander through regardless.

      Our hotel was facing directly to the rolling red dunes of the Sahara with one dune in particular standing proud high above the rest. Since we had nothing else planned we decided we would climb it for sunset. We left the departure till as late as possible to try to avoid the peak heat of the day but even an hour before sunset the heat was still easily above 35C. We donned our Moroccan clothes and trekked into the dunes on our summit adventure. Besides the heat of the sand it was easier than expected and in about 35mins we made it. The view was unbelievable! By far a massive highlight of the trip so far!

      The next day we were picked up at 8 am and started another full day (12hrs) bus transfer to our next destination. Marrakesh!
      Les mer

    • Dag 61

      Desert Camp

      9. desember 2023, Marokko ⋅ ⛅ 26 °C

      Our drive toward our desert camp was spectacular. On the fringes of the Sahara Desert, the dry, desolate canyon landscape was a very different experience than any I had before on my travels. We meandered around canyon valleys and peaked mountain tops as we traversed the inhospitable and empty region. We got a mix of oasis habitats where palm trees littered the depth of a canyon valley and 360-degree views of flat, dusty nothingness. Along the way, the emptiness would be interrupted by small villages with their brick and dirt huts that have managed to survive the stresses of time in a generally dead landscape. The purposes of their existence and their capacity to survive the hot and dry summers is unknown to me. They hold on to the tiny water streams and few palms that exist as their source of livelihood. Yet somehow, they survive. We stopped along at markets, view points, and an oasis retreat for some lunch. The last viewpoint we stayed at was the Ziz Valley, where the canyons connect and widen to become a large basin capable of supporting a greater number of palms. This was an incredible sight as you drive over nothing but dirt for hours on end only to then look down into a valley and see thousands and thousands of palm trees. It really created a unique viewing. After lunch, we continued to the desert camp. When we arrived, our bags were taken to our tents, and we were treated to Berber whiskey (green tea) within our little tent compound. This was made up of tents in a U shape surrounding a fireplace and some nice plants and rugs to line the path. We then relaxed briefly before reconvening for our sunset tour. This tour was unique as we would travel through the Sahara Desert in the old school mode of transport, Camel back. We met our camels at the front gate and began trodding along, through the sand dunes to arrive atop a particularly large dune where we could sit, grab some photos, and enjoy the sunset. The camel riding was neither smooth nor fast, but it was fun. The camels were very cute and well-behaved, making the experience much more enjoyable. I have heard some horror stories from the camel rides in Egypt. Nonetheless, we sat for about an hour and watched the sands of the desert transform from a vibrant yellow set of rolling hills into an orange glow as the sun hit the horizon. This was fantastic to watch and was only the beginning of the show. We were incredibly blessed with great weather and a desert empty of other travellers. This meant that the skyline also began to evolve from a yellow to an orange to a red to a purple as the few clouds were hit with the evening sun as it disappeared from our sight over the dunes. I had seen many photos and paintings of artists trying to capture this exact moment. The blue sky above, the yellow sun on the horizon, the purple haze within the clouds, and the orange sand dunes in the foreground. Even the most detailed paintings could never capture the moment perfectly, like being there. In the end, my favourite photo was captured with all of the above colours and my camel. This is the 19th photo. Although far from doing the reality any sort of justice, it is the closest I could get. After seeing the sunset, it was sadly time to head back to the camp. We arrived, had dinner, and then sat around the campfire to listen to some traditional Moroccan music. It was actually very good, and the Moroccans clearly have the African rhythm. The same couldn't be said for us. They were "nice" enough to let us try our luck on the instruments. You can expect the tragedy that unfolded ruined the vibe that they had created. Eventually, they allowed us to sit and relax once again, but even this was a great experience. They were all so friendly, and the dancing and singing along to their tunes was a great way to end the day. Though it didn't quite end there, we then sat amongst the sand dunes and did some star gazing to make the most of the very limited light pollution within the Sahara Desert. This was incredible as I hadn't yet set out any time to properly sit and observe the stars in the Northern hemisphere during my trip. It was great to sit with everyone, chat, and watch the stars. Sadly, after a while, it was time for bed. A great day in Morocco and a great experience in the SaharaLes mer

    • Dag 17

      The Rumor is True.

      29. oktober 2022, Marokko ⋅ ☁️ 27 °C

      A convoy of four wheel drive vehicles take us from our hotel to a Berber oasis where we regroup and have a drink on the edge of the desert. The rumour of a camel ride is true. Dianne will get her chance, along with all the rest of us. It looks as if I will have re-evaluate my attitude towards the beast if I am to get along with my desert transport.Les mer

    • Dag 8

      Sand Dünen von Erg Chebbi

      27. oktober 2019, Marokko ⋅ ☀️ 28 °C

      Wir erreichen nun die Wüste Erg Chebbi, die sich hier zu gewaltigen Sanddünen aufbaut. Die Geburtstagskinder bekommen ein kleines Ständchen gesungen. Entspannt genießen wir den Sonnenuntergang bei einem fantastischen Ausblick.Les mer

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    Er-Rissani, بني امحمد سجلماسة

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