May 5 – May 22, 2024

Málaga – the beginning
Day 1 - Leaving Spain	Day 2 - Chefchaouen	Day 3 - Fes	Day 4 - Er Rachidia	Day 5 - Merzouga	Day 6 - Tinghir
Day 7 - Aït Benhaddou	Day 8 - Marrakesh	Day 9 - More Marrakesh	Day 10 - Cascades (Ouzoud)	Day 11 - Ifrane	Day 12 - Tarifa
Day 13 - Málaga	Day 14 - Torremolinos	Day 15 - Torremolinos-1	Day 16 - Torremolinos-2	Day 17 - Caminito del Rei

May 9th – Thursday
Map Link – 131 kms

Er Rachidia – Merzouga

We didn’t have far to ride today, so it was a lazy morning. We had breakfast and got our gear on, ready to leave at 10 am. The luxury of sleeping in! And I was able to sleep: the room was quiet, dark, and the bed was very comfortable.

We left Er Rachidia behind and continued to follow the River Ziz, although for much of the time I had no idea that there was a river nearby.

Oooh – solar panels!

The landscape was barren, dry, and mostly featureless. At least it appeared featureless at our speeds as we flew along the smooth pavement. A quick stop at the dinosaur tea stop broke up the morning’s ride.

I previously had no idea that Morocco was so famous for its fossils, it even being named the “trilobite economy”. According to this wiki page, over 50,000 people make a living in the fossil trade, and it brings in over $40 million annually. That really explains the prevalence of dinosaur skeletons I saw throughout the trip.

Come in a cuppa!

The restaurant at the tea stop

Despite the heat, we sat outside under the canopied area

Since I held the Kitty, I thought that I’d share a quick price check on our bill. Our total came to 100 dirhams ($10) for three Poms (a local bottled drink), one Sprite, one Coke, and two fresh orange juices. After I paid the bill, we got back on the main road, but only for a short while. Hana slowed down for a right turn on a shabby road that looked like it was going no where. So where we were going?

And then the earth parted and the road dropped quickly into a green crevice in the desert’s crust. It was an honest-to-goodness oasis!

We were far below the desert’s surface

Lush growth

After a quick stop to appreciate the amazing emerald gem, we hopped back on the bikes and followed the valley further. It wasn’t long before we rounded a bend and found ourselves in a small village. It was a poor village, with the most basic of buildings lining the one road the passed through. Tiny farmed plots of grains and greens were tucked amongst the buildings, as close to the unseen river as possible. The villages weren’t empty, but the population was sparse. Residents waved as we rolled slowly between the buildings, and little kids would come running and cheering as soon as they heard the sound of our engines. A couple of the bolder little boys (throughout Morocco, not just here) would hold out a hand for a “low five”, which I tried to respond to as long as it was safe to do so.

Not all of the kids on this trip hailed our passing with enthusiasm. While the oasis children were happy and greeted us cheerfully, there were other times when an expressive middle finger was thrust into the air at me, and that one time when a boy threw a rock at me as I passed him. He missed both me and the motorcycle, thank goodness, but I wasn’t the only target on this trip, apparently. Others mentioned seeing a kid grab a rock from the ground, or an arm pulled back in preparation of launching a stone. I guess you can’t please all of the people all of the time.

(Photo comment: somehow, this batch of photos didn’t get caught in my “edit me!” pile, and were pulled directly into Smugmug, which has limited editing possibilities. I did what I could, but I admit that these aren’t up-to-snuff. There are also a lot of photos missing from what I remember taking, but that could be a problem on my end.)

The village Mineret

We eventually left the green behind and joined the main road that skipped most of the tiny villages. I would have been quite happy to continue to wend my way through the valley, enjoying the slow pace and the closer look at “life in an oasis”, but we had miles to cover and that wasn’t the way to do it.

Villages on both sides of the river

I had seen a number of official roadside signs warning of forest fires, and learned later that there had been a high number of fires in recent years due to drought and heat. The government was involved in a large-scale publicity campaign to raise awareness.

One of the easier towns we navigated through

The desert was once again at our feet, with very little to disrupt our views to the horizon. Desolation indeed, although like anything, I suspect that a closer look would provide evidence of all kinds of flora and fauna, hiding in what little shade could be found.

From snow fences in the Atlas, to sand fences in the desert

We passed through the large town of Erfoud, as well as some smaller towns along the way. Palms trees were a welcome splash of color against the uniform brown of both the landscape and the town walls. Massive trucks carried dozens of gas cylinders no matter where we were, but they were very noticeable here. Additionally, bicycles were more common now, with people of all ages riding in the streets and roads. The kids didn’t seem concerned about passing traffic, and they would ride side-by-side as they chatted to each other.

Horses became more common than donkeys

Hello!

Police checkpoint at the entrance to a town

Our goal today was Merzouga and we were getting close. On the horizon I could catch glimpses of reddish hills in the hazy distance – was this the Sahara Desert that we were going to? Awesome! But first: more of the flat, tan desert!

The lone tree; note the road-side flood markers

The Sahara!

In the last few miles of the day I came across another desert-specific oddity: drifting sand. Just like snow will drift across the road under certain windy conditions, the same thing happens to sand. It makes sense, of course, and now I recall seeing it as a child, but it struck me as intensely unique just now. And of course, I had a deep fear of hitting one of these drifts and crashing. Fortunately there was little traffic and it was easy to make wide lane position choices to avoid most of the sand.

Some of the many rally-type cars we saw as we got closer to the dunes

We had arrived at our (temporary) day’s destination

We pulled the bikes into the dusty parking lot of the Aubergue Kala Dunes Hotel. It was an unassuming building stuck in the middle of the flat, black-stone covered desert. It was fascinating to me to see just how many hues a desert could be: tan, black, red, brown… so much variety in something that was always just “light brown” in my crayon selection as a child.

It was early afternoon when we arrived, and we had “hours to kill” before we’d start our little non-motorcycle adventure. We weren’t going to stay here tonight, but they gave us a room where we could change out of our motorcycle gear and leave our bags. Once that had been done, our time was filled relaxing in or by the pool. While I did not go in the pool (pools are great, except that they are usually in the sun, and I am not a fan of an intense sun), I did explore the building a little bit. As I mentioned, it was very nicely decorated, and full of little details, like the stairs being made of stone containing fossils (of course!). The pool area had some seating that was out of the sun and in the steady breeze. That breeze, combined with the shade, made the 32° C temperature almost tolerable.

The interior was nicely decorated and very inviting

Fossils in the stair landing

View from the hotel’s roof, overlooking the pool (the dunes were behind me)

Looking out towards the “Little Sahara”

The town of Merzouga

One of the staff at the hotel; I love the clothing

After a delicious lunch we piled into a couple of pick up trucks and were driven across to Merzouga to start our next adventure. And because I have already packed this post with photos, I will divide the day in to two parts.

Click here for Day 5, Part II
Day 6