19 Nights in Morocco – III. Marrakech & The Sahara Tour

Throughout the first half of my time in Morocco I was constantly warned about the heat in Marrakech. It’s the kind of heat that has you asking if you should catch the next flight out of Africa. Generally I had avoided Morocco’s heat by staying within the Medinas, as these narrow streets create natural shade (and I’m sure they were designed with this in mind).

As such, I didn’t have high hopes for Marrakech. But to my surprise, my train from Fes rolled in directly after an apparently rare summer thunderstorm had passed through. The long walk to the Medina was pleasantly cooler than I anticipated. Along the way I observed the terracotta, and almost salmon color of the buildings – contrasted to the pale tan pallet of Fes.

Most international travelers enter Morocco via Marrakech, and so it is often used as a base to taken regional tours. The Medina holds a touristy open square that I found to be an absolute nightmare. I went that night and was overwhelmed by dozens of juice stands and pop-up restaurants, plus hundreds upon hundreds of presumably Moroccan tourists. Then I saw the infamous snake charmers with their cobras. All this was too much for me, so I desperately made my way outa there.

I still had doubts about whether I was going to take a Sahara tour. I wasn’t interested in dying of heat stroke, or getting stuck in a sand storm (which has been said to happen). But that night, after I had escaped from the square I found a restaurant on a quieter street with a couple of tables outside. There I sat down and got onto talking with a couple young people across from me. They had actually just returned from a Sahara tour, and they found it was a good experience. So in that instant I made up my mind – I would be going to the Sahara after all. Back at my hostel an employee easily booked me on an $85 tour to leave the very next morning.

Aside from the desert itself, the basic 2 night/3 day tours to the Moroccan Sahara are a rather questionable experience. You’ll find that nothing makes a whole lot of sense, you may get a sandstorm, and the hospitality in the desert campsites will be almost non-existent. I was the first person to be picked up from my hostel the next morning, followed shortly by an attractive guy in his 30’s who spoke English. He was a Brazilian photographer from Rio de Janeiro named Rodrigo. I would spend more than half of the tour trying to figure out if he was gay or straight, I hoped for the former …

That first day was full of scenic driving – we passed over the Atlas Mountains, through the city of Ouarzazate, and onto the Dadès Gorge. At mid-day we stopped at the ancient town of Ait Ben Haddou, which has been heavily used in film and TV, including for Game of Thrones. A local guide brought us to a shop in the village to purchase head scarves for the Sahara. He taught us how to tie them, but I found the local method was too tight and actually made my head warmer, so I took to wrapping it loosely around the brim of my bucket hat.

That night was spent in a decent hotel, one of the better amenities of the tour. There we were paired up to split rooms – Rodrigo and I wound up sharing. Aside from the mosquitos that ventured into our room, I found it difficult to sleep while Rodrigo stayed up late into the night editing photos from the day. Naturally we’d had lots of conversation about photography. As a wedding photographer wielding a Canon he seemed proud and willing to edit everything, whereas I rarely need to edit the coloration of the photos off my Fuji-film X100V.

All of the scenery within an hour or so of the Dadès Gorge could have been its own dedicated tour. The region was full of oasis-like patches filled with palms and agricultural land, all set between wildly scenic cliff faces. As we progressed through day two of driving the scenery became expectedly more arid. In the late afternoon we approached the town of Merzouga, at which time the first golden sand dunes appeared on the horizon. I was expecting a more gradual transition to this landscape, but the dunes really just came out of nowhere.

For whatever reason, in Merzouga our van made several stops so the driver could split up our group to meet different caravans of camels. We couldn’t understand why we weren’t all going to the same camp, as we’d just spent two whole days getting to know one-another. Rodrigo and I were paired with a couple of Moroccan tourists, and sadly had to part ways with some Europeans we had befriended. Once everything was in order there was an exhilarating jeep ride into the dunes, where we then waited some time for our camels to arrive. Here we met a few new people that would join us to camp, including two Czech siblings named Mateo and Emma.

I had never ridden a camel before, and let me tell you – it is a very uncomfortable thing for your hips. I do yoga, and yet this was still a struggle. Getting on and off was a whole other thing. One of the young camel boys in charge of leading us through the desert instructed the camels to stand one at a time, and you had to be prepared to be suddenly thrust backwards when it got up. Thankfully there were sturdy metal handles on the saddle that generally helped to keep your balance.

If I could mention one general qualm with this tour, it’s that it was not all-inclusive. It was a bit like Spirit Airlines – you’re taken to a nice destination, but there’s plenty of hidden fees along the way (including three lunches, a scarf, tips for the camel boys, and most egregious of all – water at the campsite). Yes, water … the most necessary thing in the desert, was not included. Dinner was included, but yet the most basic of drinks was on us. Adding to my frustration we hadn’t seen an obvious ATM in two days of driving, and there were no instructions to bring a certain amount of cash. Once at the camp I only had enough cash left to purchase one large bottle of water, but fortunately Rodrigo spotted me.

This was going to be one of those tours that I vividly remember for both the good and bad. I appreciated that we’d only be in the desert from sunset through just past sunrise (the parts of day we’d suffer the least from the heat). After a group dinner of communal Tajine I took a wander out into the dunes alone. I believe it was a full moon, so it wasn’t difficult to walk about without a flashlight. I followed the crests of dunes, past the sitting camels, and out of sight from camp. The moon would be my compass back. Being there in the Sahara fulfilled some strange fascination I’ve always had with deserts and rolling sand dunes, probably going as far back as seeing them in cartoons and television as a kid. The nighttime and sense of isolation added a whole other mystique. A gentle wind was the only noise I heard, the bit of sand flying in my face only a slight bother.

As I walked back to camp I encountered Rodrigo walking out in my direction with our Czech friend Emma. I joined them for a bit on a nearby crest overlooking camp, but it didn’t take long for me to feel like I was interrupting something – they were connecting deeply on conversations I had clearly been absent for. It felt like I was third-wheeling, and so I left to retire for the night. The wind kept the outside air just bearable, it was like being smothered in a warm blanket. But our tents (as decent as they looked), had no fans or anything. They were literal ovens. Rodrigo, Emma, Mateo, and I were all staying in one tent with a minimal amount of space and an en-suite bathroom connected. Mateo was attempting to sleep on his mattress just outside, and so I tried this as well. But soon enough we began finding small black insects that looked like Beatles roaming around. Mateo dealt with it, but I decided I’d rather suffer of heat inside the tent and leave the door open.

Maybe an hour or so later Emma and Rodrigo returned. I was curious if anything had gone on with them, and so I wasn’t really surprised when I heard a kiss in the darkness. Well, now I know he’s at least Bi, I thought. At that point I imagined they’d just settle into their cots, but NO – they were going to subject me to the full Saharan tent experience from hell. As you can imagine, I heard everything (though in a respectfully muted way on their part). I just thought, you’ve got a whole-ass desert out there, and you’ve gotta come back here to have yourselves a romp?? Not to mention, Emma’s brother was still supposedly sleeping just outside with the open door. I just sat there frozen until the *noises* subsided, and we were left with nothing more than the continuous and meditative blowing of wind outside the tent.

I don’t even know if I slept. At 5 AM we were woken to the sound of bells, inviting us to the large meal tent for a rather measly breakfast of bread with jams and coffee. I wasn’t in the mood to interact with anyone, particularly my tent-mates. I needed at least a couple of hours to pull myself together, the weak coffee did little to help this.

Prior to sunrise we departed from camp and hopped back onto the camels. This morning’s ride was longer, we spent nearly an hour going through the desert back to our pickup point where the vans would meet us. About halfway we got off the camels to enjoy sunrise over the dunes, while a few very young British backpackers paid the extra fee to sand-board. I was content setting up a few self-timer shots, and enjoying these fleeting moments in this beautiful landscape.

The drive back to Marrakech took nearly 12 hours, but it was with no sightseeing stops. I continued talking to Rodrigo, putting aside my disgust from the night. I think meeting him reminded me that I wanted to go back to Rio de Janeiro, so I began pondering a visit for later in the summer. Morocco is a very conservative country, and so I thought Brazil could be a nice contrast with a very visible queer scene.

In the city I booked two nights at a different hostel, allowing me to spend the next day exploring what I could of Marrakech. This would’ve been an ideal place to get out of the Medina to visit special sites such as gardens and palaces, however the extreme heat prevented me from even attempting this. Instead I did what I’d been doing everywhere else in Morocco – I shopped, and under the protection of the covered Medina walls and ceilings.

A bunch of the people I had met in Fes were now in Marrakech, I got dinner with them on my last night and recounted the tales of my trip to the Sahara. The desert romp story was definitely fun to tell, regardless of how uncomfortable it was in the moment. The Kiwi couple I’d met in Fes were just about to depart for their own Sahara tour. I tried my best to impart what advice I could, namely to bring enough cash and hope for the best. Shortly before dinner concluded I decided that I’d skip my Ryanair flight out of Morocco the next day in order to keep traveling here. “Morocco forever!” exclaimed my American friend Arousha.

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