MOROCCO - HIGH ATLAS
PART 8 of 8
This is the final part of our journey through Morocco. Our road trip continues through the roads and off-roads of the huge Atlas Mountains. The temperature there in December varies between +15 or +20 in the noon and drops down until 0° and in some regions to the minus degree (depending on the altitude). In total we drove over 2.500km in eight days. Our whole journey lasted two weeks, eight days of which where on the road.
Tidrite
Horseshoe in Dades Gorge
Dadès Gorges
Dadès Gorges
Tizi n'Ouano pass - 2910m
Our Duster after the off road in Tizi n'Ouano pass
Azilal Province
Agoudal
Agoudal
Azilal Province
Azilal Province
The Atlas Mountains in the Azilal Province
Lake at the Bin El Ouidane
We had some action on the way to the airport that is worth to mention. Two hours before our flight we are approx. 15km away from the airport. But one of our passengers decides to play egocentric and loudly refuses to walk 800 meters through the old town of Marrakesh to her hotel. I didn't want to end up our trip in a scandal, so I had decided to take a try. After a few hundred meters I had stopped the car. It was impossible anymore to move forward in that narrow streets. People, dogs, goats, children, mopeds and bikes were all over the place. The idea of that we have to drive back somehow, drop off the car and catch our plane in less than two hours made me nervous. But still our passenger didn’t want to get out and walk the rest. It is not easy to make me mad, but that was it: “Get out of the car!”, I yelled. “Fuck you!”, were the last words of our passenger. The diva smashed the car’s doo’s door in anger and left. Now Emre and I had to get out of that anthill as fast as possible.
"Baaam!", something hit the car. "Emre, I think I hit someone", - an angry man's eyes cached mine. I though now we will be burned alive here. Suddenly an elder man appeared in front of the car and started to help up to drive away by moving people apart. I guess it took us 20 to 30 minutes just to get out of medina - the old town. The next challenge was the navigation. GPS doesn't work in Marrakesh (as well as in Fez). So, Emre navigated me. It took him a while to figure out the map but nevertheless we are on the road into the direction of the airport. Less than an hour left until the gates are closed. Of course we took the wrong turn. Getting back on the road. I am turning the orange light signaling that I am turning right. I am looking at the side mirror and see an endless line of mopeds just driving blindly without any intention to let me do the turn. I stopped. Behind me is madness and anger. The horns are buzzing. No driver's solidarity at all. I have no other choice rather than find the best moment and just turn. Just a few centimeters saved us from a crush. The moped they are like those lemmings from the computer game: blindly following the line. We are happy that they managed to brake at the last moment.
The next challenge. We are on the airport’s parking area and looking for the logo of the firm where we took the car. No luck. We call the owner. It turns out the guy who rented us the car is a shady non official car rental, so there is no logo., we have to find the right parking lot. Left the car and now we run with the heavy bags to the gates. With understanding, people in the queue let us forward. Security control, pass control - we made it! The whole stress was for nothing. Three hours delay. As we have heard later, an egoistic passenger refuses to obey the airline’s rules and he and his family had to be taken off the plane. The whole procedure took them three hours.
Still, hungry and tired we are back to Barcelona. Another unforgettable journey. We all hope that the pandemic will be over soon and we can continue to get to know other cultures of our Planet.
EPILOGUE
Morocco impressed us with its scale, nature and culture. There are many places that we could not visit that time. Probably the next time we go deeply into the desert and explore the coast from Essaouira to Dakhla.
Marrakesh at night
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MOROCCO - ATLAS MOUNTAINS
PART 7 of 8
Our road trip through Morocco continues. After Merzouga we headed towards the serpantine roads of the Atlas Mountains.
Tinghir at the sunrise.
Tinghir
Our host Mustafa in his house
The rock walls of the Les Gorges Du Todra.
Village Tamtetoucht
Tamtetoucht
Tamtetoucht
Tamtetoucht
The Atlas Mountains
To grasp the mighty of the mountains you can find a white car and a camp at the right bottom corner of the photo for the comparison.
The Atlas Mountains
Tizi n’ Takkat n’Liloud pass. Elevation 2800 meters.
© Yuriy Ogarkov
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MOROCCO - ZAGORA
PART 5 of 8
Our next destination is the desert Erg-Chigaga near Zagora city. After passing the Atlas Mountains the landscape changes drastically. Huge open areas, dry soil in terracotta tones with little vegetation and rare oases. I have never been to a desert before, so I was exited to see one for the very first time.
Oasis on the road from Hay Almansour Adahbi to Zagora
Abdo on the roof of Kasbah Oulad Othmane.
Abdo is a young man, who is curious about politics and geography. In his free time he loves to write texts for his hip-hop compositions. Abdo would love to travel around the world. For many Moroccan it is not easy to get a visa and not many people in Morocco have the financial possibilities to travel abroad. For some people, even if they have a job in a large city, it is financially tough to visit their parents who live 300km away.
Foum Anagame Pass, Zagora
In Marrakesh we met a man called Moohaa, a berber who has his small tourist office in the old medina. Moohaa immediately connected us with his relative Said, who has a camp in the Erg-Chigaga desert near Zagora town. Erg-Chigaga is a huge deserted area with a few sand dunes and is a part of Sahara Desert. Erg-Chigaga is less known among tourists and usually has much less visitors than the Erg-Chebbi in Merzouga, especially in the winter time.
Said is a hospitable man. He doesn’t talk much and doesn’t try to entertain his visitors as other hosts usually do in touristic hot spots. In his presence you start to feel relaxed and calm too. Emre and I had a feeling that being in Said’s camp was, probably, one of the most authentic cultural experience on our trip. Unfortunately on this journey we didn’t have many opportunities to really get in touch with culture and to know people as it was on our trip to Siberia, where we were living one months with different Shamans. That’s why we are thinking about making another trip to Maghreb in the future to learn more about berber’s culture.
After meeting us in a small village near Zagora, Said guided us the way to his camp driving his old Renault 4 through the desert.
This image was made by me sitting in the drivers seat, pushing the gas pedal and simultaneously holding the camera in front of my eye while Emre was holding the steering wheel.
Odin (on the photo) works in Said’s camp. He was open to us and curious about our stories. After the talking and playing music we all enjoyed the silence of the desert’s night and crackle of the camp fire. From time to time each of us went away from the camp fire into the darkness to enjoy solitude. The night sky was completely free of any artificial light pollution. It was my first long trip without a tripod, so I haven’t done any proper image of the night sky. Instead I simply enjoyed starring into the black infinity. During the winter in the desert the temperature can drop from +18℃ in the daytime to +3℃ in the night. Said had many blankets made of the camel wool. That night was cold. Each of us needed four to five blankets to get warm.
Moroccan’s cuisine is tasty, but the variety is limited. It was an overload of Tajine for us. Almost everywhere we went we had Tajine or couscous. At one point we had a new name for this country - Tajinestan.
Zagora, Erg-Chigaga.
When I was studying design at the FH Düsseldorf I had a professor in the film class Dieter Fuder. Once he told a story about his first experience in the desert and how much he was overwhelmed by the silence that prevailed there. Since then that story never left my mind each time I thought about the desert. Erg-Chigaga was my first experience in the desert. Now I understand what professor Fuder meant. The silence of the desert is beyond the words, its is magical, it is endless and wise.
Zagora, Erg-Chigaga
After Erg-Chigaga we went to explore M'Hamid El Ghizlane and it’s surroundings. M'Hamid El Ghizlane is a small town with 7500 inhabitants and is situated about 100km from Zagora.
With M'Hamid El Ghizlane ends the national highway N9. After M'Hamid El Ghizlane there are no significant settlements only huge deserted sand area that extends to the domain of Algeria.
Our next destination is Tinghir and Erg-Chebbi in Merzouga…
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MOROCCO - DRAA-TAFILALET
From Drâa-Tafilalet starts our road trip. Finally away from the busy and chaotic cities into the vast open spaces, valleys and serpentine roads..
PART 4 of 8
Drâa-Tafilalet is one of the twelve regions of Morocco. The main economic occupations are agriculture and animal husbandry. But in the last years desertification makes these activities difficult.
From Drâa-Tafilalet starts our road trip. Finally away from the busy and chaotic cities into the vast open spaces, valleys and serpentine roads of the gigantic Atlas Mountains.
Village Telouet
Village Telouet
Kasbah Telouet.
Kasbah is a citadel, a few buildings connected together.
Kasbah Telouet was built in 18th century and was a site of pasha Thami El Glaoui 1912 - 1956.
Unfortunately the condition of Kasbah Telouet is quite poor. There are visible cracks on the carrier walls. Parts of the walls on the outside have major damages. Hopefully this historical heritage will get a proper renovation and will not fall into pieces, and no one gets hurt.
Kasbah of Tifoultoute
Sunset behind the Atlas Mountains
Our next stop is the Sahara Desert, Erg-Chigaga, situated near Mhamid and the boarder with Algeria.
© Yuriy Ogarkov
External links are selected and reviewed when the page is published. However, Yuriy Ogarkov is not responsible for the content of external websites.
All images are protected by copyright. Reproduction of any kind without permission is prohibited.
Sharing the link to the publication is welcomed.