From the Desert to the Tanneries
After a short gas/food stop, we headed further east into the Moroccan countryside. Armed with the small, but capable Fiat 500 and Alex's brilliant music playlist, we confronted our first foe. I have experienced small sand storms before in Utah, but the sight of these clouds of sand was like something out of a film. It also started to rain, making the visibility quite unnerving. However, after about 20 minutes of blind driving, we made it through.
Town after town, we made our way through towards Merzouga, a town situated on the edge of the Sahara Desert. Hours passed, but eventually, we pulled into our small hotel in the dead of night. After being greeted by our hosts, Alex and I headed out for a night walk into the desert. Well, it was pitch black, so the walk didn't last long. The various animal/critter noises surrounding us didn't help either!
By arriving at dark, we had no idea what we would wake up to the following morning. It was a pleasant surprise. Our alarms were set an hour before sunrise so that we would have time to gain a proper vantage point. Straight outside our hotel sat a dune towering above the rest, so we set our sights on that one. After about an hour of climbing, we reached the top. As you can see from the above photo, it was breathtaking.
Sunset was equally enjoyable. With two more people from our hotel, Alex and I set out sandboarding the dunes. This was when we encountered our second sandstorm. Not being in our car, however, made this one slightly more painful. After cleaning ourselves off in the hotel pool, we walked out into the desert again to look up at the stars - a perfect ending to our desert trip.
The drive back was long, but the Fiat proved to be quite quick in the mountain passes, now that I knew where the speed traps were. We arrived into Marrakech about an hour and a half ahead of schedule and proceeded to head back to the same hostel we stayed in before. Fes was the next stop, a city known for its tanneries in northern Morocco. After arriving, we met back up with Alex's friends. I was lucky to meet them all. Traveling solo can get tiring, so it was nice to have Alex along for the trip to the desert!
Two days and a lot of relaxation later, it was time to part ways with my new friends and leave Morocco. It was a long, but enjoyable eight days. A perfect mixture of European, African, and Middle Eastern culture, Morocco stood out to me as somewhat of a melting pot. If you need a bit of variety and don't know where to pick, this country could be your place.