Departure from Fes at 8 am, passing Ifrane, where the houses have sloping roofs, remarkable and unusual in Morocco. The reason is to cope with the annual snowfall. Near Azrou, 1250 m, with the Berber geomorphological name meaning “stone” or “rock”, you can see barbarian monkeys in the oak and cedar forests of the Middle Atlas. From here, we drive south along the N13 across the Middle Atlas, passing Timahdite (again, a Berber name, and if the word starts and ends with the letter “t”, it means female). We reach Midelt, 1508M, which means “the apple capital” of Morocco and is situated at the foot of the Ayachi Mountain. The town serves as a commercial agricultural center for the surrounding area and is also one of Morocco’s capitals for the mining of various minerals such as fluorite, vanadinite, quartz, and cerussite. We stop here for lunch. We continue south over the Tizi-n-Talghemt pass, known as the “She-Camel” pass. We descend through the Ziz Valley, which is particularly known for its palm trees and the length of the oasis. All along the road, there are countless “Ksars”, small villages with single houses. From here we reach the mining town of Er Rachidia (e.g. copper and malachite) and then Erfoud, famous for its date festivals and its fossils. It is fascinating to see how these millions of fossils have been turned into artifacts, so the shops are worth a visit. There is no obligation to buy anything! You continue to Rissani and finally to the famous red Erg Chebbi dunes in Merzouga. You will take a camel ride of one hour to one and a half hours, either from the camp or there. There is also the possibility to drive to the camp by off-road vehicle. You will have dinner and spend the night in an authentic nomad camp with shared bathrooms and a private tent for each couple or family. Alternatively, you can choose a luxury camp with en-suite bathrooms, king-size beds, beautiful Moroccan furniture, and lamps that are tastefully decorated to enjoy the tranquillity and beauty of the dunes.

If you wake up early enough, you can watch the spectacle of sunrise when the color of the dunes and the play of shadows is a fantastic sight. After breakfast at the camp, we drive to Tinghir and the Toudgha gorges. On the way, you will pass the water channels – “Khettarat” – into which you can descend to appreciate the architecture and the genius of this form of irrigation which prevents evaporation in the summer heat. The channels start at one end with a higher gradient until they finally emerge at the surface of the ground, where they are fed into the fields. You can learn more about these channels by reading Andrew Wilson’s work. In the gorge and valley, there is the option of walking across the gorge itself or through the gardens and fields of the village before you reach it. Later you will continue into the Dades Valley. The area that today forms the Dades Gorges was millions of years ago on the bottom of the sea. Large amounts of sediment were deposited around huge coral reefs, and over time this material became a variety of sedimentary rocks such as sandstone and limestone. Eventually, the movement of the earth’s crust led to the region being rose above the sea to form the Atlas Mountains and the surrounding landscape. The night is spent in a hotel or Kasbah.

After breakfast, we will go to the wonderful Valley of the Roses (the time of the roses is supposed to be in May) the rest of the year there are only shops or cooperatives selling water and Rosas products if you are interested in visiting, and the path of the thousand Kasbahs. We will continue on to the famous town of Ouarzazate, known for its film studios, (entrance fee is 8 € per person), and the wonderful Kasbah of Taourirte (entrance fee is 2 € per person and must be paid separately to guide you on a tour of the Kasbah), which is worth visiting. Also, visit the oldest ksar in all of Morocco, he also Ksar Ait Ben Haddou, which is the heritage of humanity and where films were filmed as Gladiator Game of Thrones Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves Babel, Aladdin…. we continue our journey in the mountains of the High Atlas then reach the mountain (Tizi n’Tichka, the top of Tichka), It is the highest road pass in North Africa, with 2260 meters high, we can also stop time for a visit to the women’s cooperative Atlas Argan oil for technical products Argan, In the afternoon we reach Marrakech (red city). Your Morocco desert tour from Fes to Marrakech ends as your driver escorts you to your riad.