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Included in our recent land tour exploring Morocco was a glamping experience in the Sahara Desert near Merzouga, a small Moroccan town known as a gateway to Erg Chebbi, a huge expanse of Saharan sand dunes.
Arriving in Merzouga, our group was met by a small fleet of 4X4s. They carried us across an expanse of flat country, mostly rock, scrub and sand, arriving at the camp after about a half hour. The camp was well laid out with almost two dozen tents, connecting walkways, a dining tent and a central fire pit area all against a backdrop of sand dunes going off into the horizon. One of the much talked about highlights of camping in the Moroccan desert are the spectacular sunrises and sunsets that shouldn’t be missed*.
Our tent interior
The tents were large with king beds, heat and air conditioning and separate shower and toilet rooms**. A dinner buffet was served in the evening and a breakfast buffet was available in the morning. The camp did not serve alcohol but allowed guests to bring their own***.
One available optional experience was a camel ride out into the dunes and a majority of the group took advantage of it while the rest explored the camp and nearby dunes. Dinner was typical Moroccan fare and after sunset there was entertainment around the fire pit. The next morning there was a guided trek out into the desert before sunrise to catch the rising “Sun over the Sahara”.
* Most of our group either took the organized hike before sunrise or hiked on their own to see the sun come up. I have to admit I wasn’t all that impressed. The sky lightened off to the east but, with no clouds in the sky as the sun started clearing the dunes, the brightness simply overwhelmed any promise of good pictures.
**The desert gets cold at night this time of year (February). The temperatures drop into the 40sF and, while most people seemed to have heat in their tent, ours wouldn’t get above the low 50sF and we had no hot water.
*** Alcohol is not readily available in Morocco, it being a Muslim country, but the government does allow the direct sale of alcohol in some stores and restaurants. Often in the restaurants when we asked if we could order wine we got a pretty gruff no! It’s advised that you get in the habit of buying what you will consume in stores and carry it with you.
There are a number of Morocan camping/glamping sites to explore with ours being Merzouga Sahara Luxury Camp linked HERE. A couple of additional sites to consider are Merzouga Spirit Luxury Camp and Oxygen Lodge Agafay
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