You know you're in Morocco when...After our adventures in Ouarzazate, we finally embarked on the 4-day tour that we had organised, covering the Valley of the Roses, the Dades and Todra Gorges and our much anticipated camel trek in Erg Chebbi, a little piece of the Sahara desert that looks like it was picked up from the main Sahara and plonked down just on the edge of Morocco.
We were up fairly early, anticipating an 8:00am pick up although, in true Moroccan style, we were unsurprised when our guide and vehicle turned up around 9:30am... patience is a virtue, I just wish that I'd hurry up and get some from somewhere!
Our guide's name was Omar, another fairly silent type that only spoke Arabic and French, and we were accompanied by an American gent from Long Island (Herb) and a French couple, Julian and Sylvana.
We set off east from Ouarzazate for the Vallee des Roses - luckily our visit coincided with the annual Fete des Roses (Festival of the Roses) which was over 4 days in the town of Kelaa-des-Mgouna.
For those of you up on their floral botany studies (Yes, Shawn, talking about you), you would know Moroccan roses are not actually Moroccan and don't look like traditional roses at all. They are actually Persian Roses, and although they don't look like roses, the flowers have the most amazingly strong aroma - the whole valley was perfumed with the beautiful scent of these flowers.
Roses, roses, everywhere
Omar, for some reason, thought that we wouldn't be interested in attending the festival so he bypassed the town and it wasn't until we were 20 minutes past it that we realised what had happened. We quickly convinced Omar to turn back so we could spend an hour in the village and see what all the fuss was about.The village was swarming with people and we spent our hour having a brief look around, grabbed some lunch (I also bought some home made nougat) and took in the sights and sounds of the fair. I thought it was a lot like the Royal Easter Show, except with flowers instead of showbags!
We then hit the road again and headed up the Dades Gorge where we were going to be staying the night.
The Dades Gorge is also known as the "Valley of a Thousand Kasbahs" and we were definitely spoiled for them. The kasbahs were originally forts, built by the perpetually warring Berber tribes, and they overlook strategic points amongst the valleys - they are a quintessential Moroccan image.
We also visited a nomad family that were currently living in a series of caves in the valley. Only the grandfather and youngest daughter were in, however they were very welcoming and allowed us to have a peek into their homes and get a glimpse of their way of life.
We arrived at our hotel, the Kasbah de la Vallee, for a much needed shower, food and rest.
The next day, we headed further up the gorge to take in the amazing view back down the valley where the river has cut steep walls into the gorge - it makes an impressive sight.
The rest of the morning, we headed back down the valley for a morning walk amongst some amazing rock formations - I forgot the name of the area, however it is translated along the lines of "Rocks that look like hands". Love it when these places are named appropriately!
Or tour group, sans Omar (L to R) Steph, hike guide, Sylvana, Julian and Herb
Sign as we entered Todra Gorge
After our hike, we headed out towards the Todra Gorge, where we visted a palmerie.Contrasted against the red hills of Morocco, the green lushness of the palmeries are irrigated by a system of canals with water from the rivers, and they provide food for the surrounding villages and families. It was a great place to escape the mid-afternoon heat.
We never really found out the real name of our guide, who asked us to call him "Omar Sherif", who was very entertaining and led us into the palmerie, showing us the gardens and water canals.
While we were there, we visted a 75 year old Berber man, called Ouassan, who was an absolute classic. He quickly invited us into his garden for mint tea (a.k.a. Berber whisky - non-alcoholic), and dates picked from his own palm trees.
He then proceeded to show us his many talents, including how to pick him up by his ears (neither Julian or myself could manage this), and then scampering up palm trees like a 12 year old.
All he asked for in return was that we send him the photos we took, and we're happy to report that we did when we got back to Marrakesh.
We stayed the night in the gorge and the next morning, after dropping off Herb at the grand taxi station, we headed out to Rissani to start our camel trek!
We drove through increasingly desert like landscape until we reached "Kasbah des Hommes Bleues", where we were starting our trek. We had tea, played a bit of music, then went out to meet the camels.
The first thing to say is that camels are actually pretty high off the ground, a fact I noticed as I (un)gracefully mounted my camel. The second thing to note is that, after the initial novelty wears off, the loping gait of camels is definitely a challenge to "get in the swing of" resulting in either a sore lower back, sore inner thighs or both.
However, in terms of appropriate modes of transport, doing the desert on a camel is definitely the way to go!
The plain scorched earth type desert soon gave way to the undulating red dunes of the erg, the landscape is truly amazing, desolate and beautiful, all at the same time. This is where Steph and I both got a bit snap happy, however we just couldn't help it!
We took the long and hard hike up the dune to try and get a better view of the sunset over the desert - absolutely beautiful views from the top!
At the top of the dune, one of the guides from the other groups had a "little friend" - a small orange coloured lizard called a "sand fish". During the summer they burrow in the sand closer to the surface for the heat and can be fairly easily caught (providing you know what to look for). The desert nomads sometimes catch them for food. I thought the lizard was cute, Steph also thought it was cute until it wriggled and Steph promptly yelped and dropped the lizard on the sand where it quickly burrowed and disappeared. Luckily the guide knew what to look for and recovered the lizard fairly quickly.
We headed back down the dune for dinner, tagine of course, where we also cracked open the bottles of red that we had picked up earlier that day. Having a good meal in the desert, quaffing some glasses of red is truly one of the standout experiences of our travels so far!
We slept out under the stars (some of us didn't sleep well because they were scared of mystery desert-crawly things crawling all over them), were woken up at around 5:00am to see the sunrise and then returned to the kasbah.
We had breakfast, showered and headed out for Rissani where we said "Adieu" to Omar, Julian and Sylvana, who were returning to Ouarzazate, and caught the 10:00am bus to Fes, the oldest imperial city in Morocco and our next stop on our Moroccan loop!
