We plan on heading into Iran in three days and apparently Internet is very hard to come by, so I’ll try to get a few posts ready to be published automatically throughout the next week. I promise we will try our best to let you know how it’s going and our where abouts in Iran. I know how nervous some of you are about us going there, and how jealous the rest of you are. Ha, ha.

Anyways, for now, enjoy these photos. Ciao! –Laura–

The giant heads at the top of Nemrut Dagi in eastern Turkey. Behind them is an enormous mound, which Chris and I found even more impressive than the heads, because every little stone was put there by humans. It is supposedly the burial mound of the king, although no one really knows if his remains are truly underneath it.

One of the lions guarding the burial mound of Nemrut Dagi in eastern Turkey.

Chris pointing out that various types of cigarettes were listed in the dessert section in a restaurant in Brasov, Romania.

A lovely gate in Fez, Morocco.

A stop sign in Morocco.

Fez, Morocco.

An excellent example of the craftsmanship of Morocco found in the detail of a door.

Minutes before leaving camp and starting our 60 kilometer trek.

I laugh so hard when I look at this photo, I cry. Look at Chris! Poor guy is all beet down from the Sahara. This is him taking his last few steps of the 60 kilometer walk. Behold, the Erg Chigaga dunes lie just ahead of him.

Chris resting and Rashid cooking during our first lunch break of our 3-day trek through the Sahara.

Yeah! We’re on camels! As you can see I was extremely happy.

I’m riding a full loaded camel down a mini-dune. It was a little scary. It gets your heart going and blood pumping a little to remind you that you’re alive. That was a lot of weight on those thin camel legs.

Our camels and guide, Rashid, in the Sahara desert in Morocco.

Sahara desert, Morocco.

Chris walking through the Sahara desert.

Sahara desert trek. Note, you don’t ride the camels unless you arrange to pay for another camel so that you can ride instead of walk. This was not made clear to us before we started our journey. Ah well, it’s one walk I’ll never forget.

This is Amezrou, the old Jewish kasbah near Zagora, Morocco.

Chris and Mohammad, the man who arranged our 4-night, 3-day Sahara trek. He was very friendly.

Chris took this shot.

Marrakech, Morocco.

Marrakech, Morocco.

Marrakech, Morocco.

Essaouira, Morocco.

A candle holder in the Gothic cathedral in Milano, Italy.

A cyclist in Piacenza, Italy.

Chris looking handsome as ever at the top of Nemrut Dagi in eastern Turkey.

Related posts:

1. Sahara Diaries, Part 3: Camel Trekking and Arabic Lessons
2. Sahara Diaries, Part 5: Night of the Thousand Stars, Snakes, and other Deadly Encounters
3. Sahara Diaries, Part 4: Rashid, Pain, and More Pain

Sahara Desert spider. This little guy crawled into our tent one night during our Sahara Trek. Our guide quickly killed it. After looking at the spider more closely, I was glad he did.

During our 3-week adventure in Morocco, I noticed some interesting things that I thought I could share with you.  Currently we are in Bucharest, Romania. We just arrived here yesterday after a one day layover in Milano, Italy and before that we spent a quick two days in Madrid. I will get some photos up of Madrid shortly. In the mean time enjoy the following.

CERAMICS & TILES

Morocco has tiles on some roofs that strongly resemble the ones used in Italy, only the tiles are smaller and are usually found in one of three colours:  orangish-red, blue or green.  After visiting a ceramic producing town near Zagora in south-eastern Morocco, we learnt that green is the most common and traditional colour for not only roof tiles but also any shape that can be made out of ceramic, like ash trays, serving platters, plates, sugar bowls and the infamous Moroccan tanjine pot.  In fact, green is the colour of Islam.

The roof tiles in Morocco are very much like the ones in Italy. They are generally green, but you’ll also see blue and an orangish-red.

The many different colours of the ceramics are produced with primarily natural dyes.  The yellow ceramics are dyed with saffron, the blue with indigo, and the light pinkish-red with henna water and lemon. The green is made from a combination of three things, one of them being copper. Some ceramics are fired once to make them off-white in colour, then they are decorated with naturally produced henna.   After one more firing in the kiln, the design is everlasting.

FOOD

Lunch and dinner in Morocco start with complimentary bread and a small plate of fantastic fresh olives.  Salt and pepper are kept in small, communal dishes on the table instead of shakers. This means everyone must use their fingers to pinch the salt and/or pepper onto their food.  The pure lack of soap, toilet paper, hand blowers and paper towels in restrooms has led me to eating my meals without the aid of salt and pepper.

A weekly market in one of the small towns of Morocco. If you’re hungry while shopping you can grab a roasted corn cob.

ALCOHOL

It is almost impossible to find alcohol in Morocco, although it is available. The local brew is called “SPECIAL BEER”, that’s literally and actually the name of the beer. It comes in itty-bitty 24 cl bottles. Roughly three of these bottles equates to one standard Canadian bottle of beer.  The servers in one bar had a habit of leaving the empties on the table, therefore making Chris and I look like extreme alcoholics when we had accumulated 12 bottles on the table within a couple of hours.

MOSQUES

Islam is the main religion in Morocco yet prayer call is not heard as often nor as loud as in Turkey. In fact, the call to prayer in El-Jadida sounded very different. It sounded shorter and staccato. Mosques are not as plentiful or easy to locate.

A large mosque in Tangier’s medina overlooking the Strait of Gibraltar. You can just make out Spain in the distance.

The only indication of a building being a mosque is the 5–6 story square tower. There are no domed roofs, extra spires, or elaborate decorations and tile work like the mosques of Turkey.  In a sense, the mosques had a much more humble feeling.

WOMEN’S CLOTHING

Young girls and adolescence wear western styled clothes like tight emo-jeans and T-shirt.  The majority of women and teenage girls wear headscarves and occasionally you’ll see a girl as young as seven wearing one.  The women here must have huge wardrobes in order to have a headscarf that perfectly matches the long-sleeved shirt which she has to wear under the floor-length backless summer dress. This is the attire of a very modern Moroccan lady in a big city like Meknes or Fes.

The traditional outfit of Moroccan women. It is worn over their normal clothes, like a jacket.

In nearly all the rural cities, towns and still within the larger cities the majority of women continue to wear the traditional outfit, a long-sleeved, ankle-length, hooded, “jacket”.  Patterns and colours are limited only by the imagination.  They come in patterns like leopard, zebra, bright red, green, purple, floral print, vibrant turquoise etc.

The tanneries in Fez’s medina souk. This is one of the first stages in creating the many fashionable bags or purses for sale. The entire area reeked of death (like Brooks Alberta).

MEN’S CLOTHING

The variety of mens dress exceeds anything yet seen in the history of the Western world. Primarily men just wear pants and collared T-shirts, but you will also see men in thobes (a long-sleeved, floor length, white coloured outfit, which kind of looks like a dress shirt that’s been tailored to the ankles), a jacket somewhat like the ladies only without the hood and slightly wider cut and lastly some men wear long-sleeved, floor length, hooded robes usually dark brown or green in colour.

A husband and wife stroll through the Eassouria medina souk together.

When men are dressed in these with the hood up they remind me of the Jwa’s from Star Wars.  The hoods are very unique in how they point at the top and how the men fold them up so they can see.

SHOES

Moroccan shoes.

This style of shoe is “very Moroccan”. All ages of people wear them.  It is almost as if the design of the shoe developed out of function (like most things).  You know when you’re in a hurry to catch someone who just left your house, how you slip on your shoes really quickly flattening the heals into the shoe?  The Moroccan shoe looks like this has happened to all of them, only the maker sewed down the heel in the squished down position.

TOILETS

Carry around soap in a plastic bag in your purse because 98% of toilets do not have any type of hand sanitizer.  It is also wise to carry around hand sanitizer to use before/after toilets and eating.   In Morocco , 95% of the toilets are squat toilets. If you are not use to these it helps to wear a skirt which can be easily lifted out of the way.

Squat toilets are everywhere in Morocco.

To avoid as much spray back as possible it is important to put your feet at quite a wide stance, but even more important is squatting as low as you can (without falling into the festering hole of waste beneath you!). My last piece of advice on how to squat properly and come out relatively clean is aim. The better you are at aiming for the drain increases your chance of less spray back by ten.  Some squat toilets have a flush, some don’t. Look up and around for a string to flush. If you don’t see anything, I can guarantee you’ll see a tap and a little bucket.  Without thinking about it too much, turn on the tap, fill the bucket and dump it down the hole. This must be the most energy efficient flush on the planet, but now you see why I highly recommend carrying soap and hand sanitizer. Toilet paper, very important, is not used really in many places believe it or not.  Carry your own toilet paper at all times. Sometimes there will be a garbage bin with you and your squat toilet. If not, try to use as little as possible and wash it down the drain with your little bucket. Do not put tampons down the toilets, you may really, really regret it.

Related posts:

1. Sahara Diaries, Part 2: Berber Food and Folk Music
2. Observations of Morocco: El-Jadida, Essaouria and Marrakech
3. Sahara Diaries, Part 1: Marrakesh to Zagora

Forget everything I said before. This place is not romantic. It’s deadly, unforgiving, and miserable. Full of pain and agony.

Do not come here. Do not let your loved ones come here.

Okay, maybe not that bad, but right now Laura and I are in low spirits. We’re tired. We ran out of mineral water, and can’t help but remember how Rashid carelessly drank some, and used some more for dishes and washing on our first day. Rashid can drink the well water, but we can’t for legitimate fear that the bacteria and microbes will make us sick. We’ve put some treatment pills in a bottle of well water, but have to wait two hours for them to do their work. We’re very thirsty, and have aches and pains throughout our bodies. Rashid said it would be an hour from our lunch spot, but it’s actually been about three, and the heat is the harshest we have experienced. My little travel compass/thermometer maxed out today at an unbearable 50 degrees Celsius.

We’re at Erg Chigaga as I write this, finally, but rather than feel proud or excited by this unique place, we feel hollow and taken advantage of. The man in Zagora who sold us our camel trek, Mohammed, was very friendly, with a sincerity of laughter that bespoke of a straight-forward and honest business man. So when we asked him questions about how long each leg of “the ride” would be, and how long we would be “on the camels on any given stretch”, his answer of three to four hours satisfied us. Yet here we are. It’s the end of our last day in the desert, we’re at Erg Chigaga, the great 40km expanse of dunes on the Algerian border, and we haven’t been on a damn camel once. We walked 60km through the Sahara Desert to get here, and we’re feeling too beat physically and mentally to climb the great 300m dune that’s just right over there.

Shariff and Mimoun drudge on. We try to keep up.

Erg Chigaga stretches for about 40km, and is also only about 40km from Algeria.

The dunes of Erg Chigaga. “Erg” means dune.

Dunes and tamarist trees.

We asked after the camels again when we arived. Rashid’s response was the same as usual: apres, apres, “after, after.” This time we pushed him. “After what, Rashid? After we set up camp?”

“Wahha, wahha,” he said. “Okay, okay.”

But then, before we knew it, he sent the camels off into the distant plain to feed. We can see them now, from where we sit atop a small dune. They’re at least 4km away and the light is failing fast. There’s no way we can muster the energy to get out to them, and no way Rashid can collect them before sun down. We simply can’t understand why he won’t let us ride them. Laura is very disappointed and upset. I can’t blame her, either. She never rode a camel while she lived in Saudi Arabia. During  her one opportunity she was too young and scared to give it a go, and her hopes of making up for it by spending three days on one have been sunk. Riding a camel was one of her main goals coming to Morocco, and we thought we had it all but cinched when we booked our tour.

At this moment, right now, we are in one of the lows that make the highs of travel feel so amazing in comparison. It sounds like a small thing, riding a camel, but after the beating heat and strain of walking 60km in the desert, that small thing is the whole world to us right now. We’re pissed off, frankly.

One of my goals on this trip, and in my life, is to “live without expectation,” what the Hindus call “relinquishing the fruits of your labour.” While I can’t claim to be there yet, I am trying. But it’s not easy. This trip was not what we expected. We’ve decided to take it up with Mohammed when we see him after. For now, I’m not sure my tired legs can even get me up one of the bigger dunes to watch the sun go down. My ankle is swollen like a baseball and each step is agony.

Epilogue

That was my last entry in my journal from the dessert. It’s a sour note to end on, and one I’m happy to say didn’t last long. Within five minutes of that entry, we had purged the negativity from our systems. Me, through writing it down, pretty much as you’ve just read it, and Laura through telling me how she was feeling and shedding a few stressed-out, tired, tears. We enjoyed a hug and felt some of the excitement and challenge come back to us. Aching, dehydrated, tired to the bone, we egged each other on and raced up the dunes, toward the highest peak of Erg Chigaga. The sunset was coming on fast. We could see several other visitors silhouetted at the top of one of the lesser dunes, watching the sunset we had sought for four days through the desert. No doubt they had been brought out that afternoon in the relative comfort of a 4WD, and the thought of them enjoying what we had earned while we sat and moped buoyed us on further, until we were panting and gasping for breath as our tired legs carried us up one, then another of the big dunes. Soon we were on the ridge leading to the top of the biggest. The 4WD crowd were no doubt too lazy to bother climbing it, we told each other, laughing.

“Good,” we declared. “We earned it. Those bastards couldn’t get through the desert. They probably have air-conditioned tents down there.”

And although we made the top moments after the sun had dipped below the horizon, the effort had redeemed us. The sunset didn’t matter. Being here didn’t really matter, either. But the effort of just getting here did, camels or no camels. That last sprint redeemed us, and it redeemed a desert trek that will live with us always, standing out among months of travel as something unlike anything else we’ve ever done.

It also didn’t hurt that we ran into Mohammed that night. The next morning, Laura got her camel ride after all.

Sunset over Erg Chigaga. The bastards on the top of the dune likely got out here by 4WD. Bastards.

The view from the top. The sun had just set on us.

Laura channels Arabian Nights.

Your intrepid bloggers. Yes, it is that big. Bigger even.

Camel rides, at last.

This is the final part of a six-part series on our camel trek in the Moroccoan Sahara. To read the full story, please click here.

Related posts:

1. Sahara Diaries, Part 3: Camel Trekking and Arabic Lessons
2. Sahara Diaries, Part 5: Night of the Thousand Stars, Snakes, and other Deadly Encounters
3. Sahara Diaries, Part 4: Rashid, Pain, and More Pain

Some night photography. I “light painted” the tent with my LED flashlight. This was a 30 second exposure.

May 16, 2010 — Midday

The nights out here have been wonderful. Not only do we get to rest while things cool off considerably and Rashid sets to work on the evening meal, but we also get to enjoy the type of clear, starry sky you can only find in a dry environment far from city lights, in the desert or the arctic. The company we paid to arrange this trek is called Caravane Mille Etoiles, the Caravan of the Thousand Stars, and the name is apt. The only thing they should work on is actually telling people that it is not a camel ride into the desert so much as a relentless death march in the baking sun.

The dunes themselves have also been enjoyable, even though we have only been camping among relatively small ones (maybe 50m tall). Burying one’s sore feet in the still-warm sand and watching the sun set over a sea of dunes must be one of life’s great pleasures. The colours and textures that come out of the sand are predictably beautiful, although serious photography is all but impossible due to the heat, fatigue and just wanting to enjoy the last light of day without looking through a camera viewfinder.

Rashid’s kitchen.

Taking these things off is the best part of the day. Actually, we both switched from sandals to our hiking shoes after the first day or two. This is the view from our tent.

Sunset over the Sahara.

Yours truly. Photo by Laura.

Laura, int he best light of the day, right before sunset.

One of the other highlights of our trek has been the array of desert life we’ve been lucky enough to come across. Of course living next to two huge, blundering camels has had its moments. Camels aren’t known for being shy about their bodily processes, pooping and peeing whenever and wherever the mood strikes them (including all over themselves), and burping and farting as they spend the night just outside our airy tent. It’s like a desert symphony to offset the beauty of the starry sky.

Shariff and Mimoun are also natural garbeurators, eating anything put within reach of their searching camel lips. They’ll eat anything from food scraps like orange and melon peels (they like these a lot) to the scrubbiest thorn bushes in the desert. And that’s just breakfast. Shariff even ate Laura’s prized fossilized rock.

Our most common view of the camels.

These desert birds live in pretty much all of the tamarist trees.

But we’ve enjoyed other wildlife as well, including plenty of scarab beetles, red ants, a burrowing owl, crows and small desert birds. This morning Laura spotted a dung beetle methodically rolling his breakfast (one of Shariff’s ping-pong sized droppings) home for the wife and kids. We’ve also seen lizards and had fatal encounters with a camel spider and snake. Thankfully, the encounters were fatal for the spider and snake, not us.

Actually, the snake was probably the most dangerous thing that has happened to us during the trek. Rashid was calm but stern after he spotted the snake on a nearby dune, not two minutes after leaving camp this morning. Laura and I went for our cameras as the snake slithered its way up a dune away from us, but if we went closer than about four meters, Rashid would say loudly, “Attencion! Attencion!”, motioning us back. When he snatched a tent pole and went after the creature, Laura and I both went into conservator mode, trying to tell Rashid that it wasn’t necessary to kill the thing, as the snake clearly only wanted to get away.

The Saharan Horned Viper.

But Rashid answered by hooking two fingers downward in the air with a quick hissing sound, in obvious imitation of snake fangs sinking into their prey. “Mort,” he said, simply. “Mort.”

So we watched as Rashid deftly decapitated the snake with one blow of the tent pole, followed by several more for good measure. After some prodding and our usual halted communication, we later learned from Rashid that this type of horned snake (he didn’t know the name in English, Arabic, Berber, or French) can kill a person with one bite. The venom is fatal every time, and the victim might only have one to three hours to live after a bite. (Update: After being spurred on by our friend Christine, who identified this beastie as a Saharan Horned Viper, or Cerastes Cerastes, I did a bit more research. The bite is not necessarily immediately fatal, but can lead to severe complications if gone untreated. Don’t believe everything you hear in the desert, apparently.)

Believe me when I say, we were very much on the lookout for other snakes after that. We were also quite grateful to have been ignorant of this knowledge during the first three and a half days of our trek.

This snake is deadly poisonous. If you are bitten, you can count your hours left on one hand.

We have one more hot afternoon of walking to go. We feel better now after eating and a short nap. Rashid says it is only about an hour more. After lunch the desert always feels more romantic and exciting. Our energy levels are up and we ready to set out again.

This is just one part of a six-part series on our camel trek in the Moroccoan Sahara. To read the full story, please click here.

Related posts:

1. Sahara Diaries, Part 3: Camel Trekking and Arabic Lessons
2. Sahara Diaries, Part 6: The Lows and the Highs
3. Sahara Diaries, Part 4: Rashid, Pain, and More Pain

No entry for yesterday. Just too damned hot. Figured I’d make the effort today, despite my fatigue, before time and distance dissipate my memories like a camel fart in the desert.

Rashid. Guide, cook, keeper of the camels (keeping them away from us, at least).

I’m not a religious man, but “prayer” is the closest thing to what was going through my mind as we struggled up and then crested each successive rise this morning only to discover yet another scrubby valley to cross—prayer that each one would be the last, that we would finally see the dunes and scattered trees that might provide enough shade for our mid-day break. But valley after valley was the same baked hardpan. All we saw was more desert. Another shadeless expanse to cross. Another few kilometers before yet another rise and the hope that this might be it. We crossed about eight of these valleys this morning alone, and the temperature is above 40 degrees out here.

I have blisters and arch pain in my right foot, as well as growing swelling in the ankle (possibly an old injury acting up). Laura is about the same, with blisters, sore knees, bites, and what she figures is heat rash on her legs.

Although it is day four of five, we still haven’t ridden the damn camels, and the black thoughts that run through my head as we lumber on, watching Rashid and two camel asses get progressively further away with our dwindling water supply strapped to their backs should not be repeated in polite company. Let’s just say I have considered several of the ways a body could be disposed of in the desert.

Rashid and the camels.

This was probably the most brutal section of the trek, with no shade or change in the rocky landscape for at least 12 km.

This is what this place does to things. This is an old pack camel who died in one of the bivouacs from disease. After it’s death, the owners brought it out to return to the desert.

Every step hurts, but we only have one more afternoon trek to reach the massive 300m dunes of Erg Chigaga, our final destination. We’ll spend the night there, hopefully after a camel ride of some sort. I’ve asked Rashid about the camels, as I know Laura is really looking forward to riding them, but his response is the same: “apres, apres.” He actually seems to feign a bigger language barrier than usual whenever I bring up the camels. It’s odd.

The Tamarist trees in the distance marked the end of one of the toughest stretches we faced, and were the answer to the prayer mentioned above. They were a happy sight indeed.

Tomorrow morning we’ll be driven from Chigaga back to Zagora, after a couple of interesting stops along the way, and it will all be over. Of course, it’s not all pain and misery. Overall, Rashid has been a great guide, if a little stoic. I’m not sure if it’s just the language barrier holding him back, or if he’s just quiet, preferring the solitude of his own thoughts to chatter. Of course, this is an ideal mindset for the desert, where even speaking, reaching for a water bottle, or bending over to pick up an interesting rock can require an iron will. The heat and exertion rob all thought and sap all extra energy. For me, retreating into my own head has helped keep me focused on just taking the next step.

Of course, we’d be lost without Rashid, at least in a figurative sense; actual navigation out here is not as difficult as I had thought. There are plenty of landmarks, including distant hills, trees, dunes, and the far-off mountains to the north. The desert is stunningly beautiful, and far more diverse in its landscape and wildlife than I would have believed. No we wouldn’t be lost, but Rashid has been indispensable in myriad other ways. As Laura and I lounge in the shade, even as I write this, Rashid is preparing tea before starting on lunch. He rises before us, prepares the meals, does most of the washing, and tends the camels. He is also necessarily relentless in marching us on to Chigaga, never varying his pace at all. Even though at times I have considered bludgeoning him with a rock, deep down I am grateful. It has occurred to me more than once that if Rashid were to take the camels and abandon us, we could easily die out here. Even though we’d know which direction to go, without food, water, and shade, we wouldn’t last long. Of course, we could probably flag down one of the 4WD vehicles that occasionally go by in the distance, kicking up dust on the rutted tracks to Chigaga, carrying tourists too lazy (or too smart) to attempt the 60km trek. We haven’t seen any other trekkers except a small group on the first day, and a few guides bringing camels back from Chigaga.

Not that we really signed up to walk ourselves. What we thought we were buying was a camel ride into the desert, perhaps supplemented with some walking. Hell, we’d have been happy to have a walk supplemented with even a little bit of riding, but so far nothing. Shariff and Mimoun, the camels, do have a large burden in carrying our water, food, gear, and other essentials necessary to sustain us out here. Not to mention our own baggage, which although only amounts to about 25 kilos, still contains such desert “essentials” as our two computers, two rain coats, and Laura’s blow dryer.

We’re not looking to strain the camels, which carry themselves like big, stinky champions, but we can’t help thinking that maybe Mohammed should have engaged a third camel if the baggage load is too much to add the weight of a person.

I have been doing my best to help out when possible (as has Laura), in setting up camp, loading and unloading the camels, and with meals and cleaning up, but Rashid is the main bread winner around here. And since it’s our bread he’s winning, we don’t let that bother us too much.

But here we are, in relative luxury. For the moment we have shade, a large blanket to lay on and our sleeping mats to cushion the stones below. We have hot mint tea, cookies and peanuts. The tea is actually good to drink in the heat; the body has less work to regulate the temperature and process the liquid. We have enough mineral water left that we should be abel to get through to tomorrow without resorting to treated well water. We have a hot lunch on the way, and one more night in the Sahara to look forward to.

Tea, cookies, and salted peanuts. Our pre-lunch snack. I’ll never be a good enough writer to be able to convey how good this stuff tastes after four hours in the desert. That’s Laura’s fossil and lithics (stone tools) collection in the background.

This is just one part of a six-part series on our camel trek in the Moroccoan Sahara. To read the full story, please click here.

Related posts:

1. Sahara Diaries, Part 3: Camel Trekking and Arabic Lessons
2. Sahara Diaries, Part 6: The Lows and the Highs
3. Sahara Diaries, Part 5: Night of the Thousand Stars, Snakes, and other Deadly Encounters

Camels!

May 14, 2010

There is only an hour or two between the previous entry and this one. Since I wrote the last bit, we have eaten the day’s lunch. Rashid prepared and served us what he called “Berber Omelette,” an egg and tomato dish with peppers, onions and the usual spices that was remarkably like Turkish menemen. The camels are nearby, contented from the water we drew from a well right before lunch, and feeding on scraggly shrubs. Rashid is washing the dishes, which generally involves splashing some untreated well-water on everything and sloshing it around a basin. I try not to think that it’s the same basin the camels have drank out of, or that Rashid washed his feet in, or that Laura and I have also used to wash. Desert hygiene is not city hygiene.

At least he’s using soap.

Our guide, Rashid, drawing water for himself, the cuisine, cleaning, and the camels. Laura and I stayed to mineral water, mostly. Rashid’s body can handle the microbes, whereas ours are accustomed to completely different ones.

We came across essentially one well per day, which may surprise some, but we were technically on the edge of the desert. Beyond our final destination (Erg Chigaga) there are no wells.

Laura helping fill one of the two 10L gerry cans that got us through.

Laura and I are actually feeling spoiled and content on our rug in the shade. The day has already cooled somewhat and soon we’ll be packing up to continue the day’s journey. We haven’t actually ridden the camels yet, as they have been loaded down with our baggage to begin with, but we’re thinking we may this afternoon if the sand is too hot on our sandaled feet. Rashid has said vaguely that we will ride them apres, apres, “after, after.”

The afternoon winds are picking up a bit after the calm morning, and if we can expect the same hard winds as we experienced last night at the bivouac, then we will be heading westward into the setting sun and blowing sand, so the afternoon may present its own challenges.

Shariff (“Sha-reef”), the camel. Shariff is 20, and like his buddy Mimoun, will likely be doing this for ten more years. The nose ring is actually used by the camel guide to lead the animal.

Mimoun (“Mee-moon”) the camel. Mimoun is 19 years old, and will likely live to about 30. His job is to walk back and forth in the desert, poor guy.

I wanted to mention that we have been enjoying some very basic Arabic help (and I mean very basic). Our communications with Rashid now span French, English, and crude Arabic, but we’re able to communicate most things well enough. We also got some primers last night from the other fellows. Unfortunately I only pulled out the notebook part way through, so most of our impromptu Arabic lesson has been lost, strings of foreign syllables that simply don’t stick in my mind. This is all that remains, based on my notes and my memory:

La bass = Hello

La = No

Chukran = Thank you

Gh’la = watermelon

Schwee-ah, schwee-ah = little, little

Sa-ha = Cheers

Bis sa-ha = Bon apetite

Sabah-hak-hairh = good morning

Yella! = Let’s go / Hurry up

Wa-ha = Okay

*Spellings are phonetic interpretations. Try to pronounce each letter. The H’s are somewhat guttural.

Okay. Now, just walk to the other side. Simple!

This is just one part of a six-part series on our camel trek in the Moroccoan Sahara. To read the full story, please click here.

Related posts:

1. Sahara Diaries, Part 6: The Lows and the Highs
2. Sahara Diaries, Part 5: Night of the Thousand Stars, Snakes, and other Deadly Encounters
3. Sahara Diaries, Part 4: Rashid, Pain, and More Pain

The dusty streets of Zagora feel very far away and very long ago. It’s hard to believe it was only yesterday. The contrast between the desert and even a small town like Zagora couldn’t be more pronounced. When the wind dies down out here, it is perfectly still. Perfectly quiet.

The view from under our Tamarist tree. That’s another tamarist beside the dune. These trees are quite literally the only shade to be had out here, and tend to grow only in the dunes.

We are about six to ten kilometers from the camp where we spent last night. It is about 30 degrees Celsius in the shade right now, and we are passing the hottest part of the day under a desert tree. Our young guide, Rashid, 28, tells us it is called Tamarist in French, “Lit-luh” in Arabic, and “Tashwoodth” in Berber. He doesn’t know the English name. Rashid is himself Berber, descended from the desert nomads who once lived off the land in this area, but who have mostly settled down in nearby communities since Rashid’s grandfather’s time. He speaks only slightly more English than we do French, which is very little indeed, but we’ve been getting along well regardless of language difficulties. Hand gestures and our own searching French do surprisingly well, as we try various synonyms of what we want to say in the hopes of hitting upon the half-forgotten vocabulary of long-ago French classes. Although it is now just the three of us making our way into the desert, last night we enjoyed the company of four or five other young Berber men, most of them Rashid’s age.

The bivouac encampment we stayed in is design for some 20 to 40 visitors at capacity, but we were lucky enough to be the only two. It is just past the high season around here, a time when the desert starts to get too hot for most. The camp includes several heavy wool Berber tents for sleeping, a permanent squatter toilet outhouse, and a communal tent for preparing meals and relaxing among rugs, cushions and low tables.  Our mouths were watering as we sat in the communal tent (named, without a hint of irony, The Restaurant), smelling the tajine stewing in the next room and enjoying traditional Berber music. Tajine is probably Morocco’s most signature dish (alongside couscous), and you can find it on menus throughout the country. A good tajine can be made from pretty much anything you’d put into a stew, and the best tajines use only the freshest local ingredients; oil, carrots, potatoes, onion, yams, almonds, dates, lemon, olives, and peppers are all common, though seldom found altogether in the same tajine. It can be a vegetarian dish, or include beef, chicken, fish or lamb. Really, anything goes, but what makes every tajine a tajine is the conical ceramic cooking dish, or swaoui, a proper stewing time of several hours, and the inclusion of the typical Moroccan spice medley: saffron, paprika, cumin, ginger, salt and pepper. The night’s tajine was served with bread, communal style in a large  swaoui in the middle of the table, and was very delicious. We were surprised to get desert as well: a heaping plate of watermelon.

The warm and inviting “Restaurant” at our first night’s bivouac camp. It was way cozier in there than in the harsh winds of the evening. The winds died down after sunset, and we enjoyed the first of several beautiful night skies.

Laura wearing her turban. The first night out there was unbelievably windy, so these things were necessary to keep the sand out of our mouths. In the coming days, they would prove to be the most important garment we owned, providing shade and shelter from the beating sun and regulating our body temperature better than any single thing we did.

The music was a perfect way to bracket the meal, as our Berber companions began to “jam” while the tajine was just getting started, and picked up where they left off after dinner. It impresses me deeply whenever I am exposed to a culture or family with such integral music traditions. Although music is very important to me, and I was a musician myself some years ago, I was not raised in a participatory music tradition, and its not nearly as widespread in our culture than in many places in the world. In the West, musicians are specialized individuals who perform their trade for the entertainment of others. Among the Berbers, and cultures with similar traditions, everyone is a musician, and music is not something to watch or listen to so much as to make together. These traditions will always be stronger in a culture where individuals must depend on entertaining themselves and each other, rather than being entertained by electronic mass media.

But making and sharing music is universal; every culture in human history has folk music traditions. I think our easy access to prepackaged entertainment in the West has trained us away from the instinct to simply go for it.

Anyway, Laura and I did our best to simply go for it, taking our turns clapping along, as well as playing the cymbals, beating the drums and dancing. I also tried the lute, but with a foreign tuning scheme, ten strings and no frets, I found it far more difficult than guitar, and could only manage a few feeble notes. The Berber songs typically used a call-and-response singing structure and although the words were unintelligible to us, most of the songs were lamentations. The sorrowful wails in Arabic and (I assume) the Berber dialect of Tashelhit seemed to speak of tragedies and injustices borne out of the distant past. These were occasionally offset by more upbeat melodies, with the pounding rhythm of makeshift tam tams (drums) thumping into frenzied finales. Other songs were instrumental, led by the lute player, and seemed to include improvisational elements based around a traditional song structure.

After some encouragement Laura and I were induced to share the only piece of Canadiana that would come to mind, although I’m not sure “Barrett’s Privateers” has ever been accompanied by such African-influenced percussion. And I, for one, choose to believe it was that relentless rhythm that drove the lyrics clean out of my head, forcing us to repeat the first verse four or five times before begging off at last in an awkward ending that seemed to leave our new friends unsure what to make of it all. They didn’t ask us to sing again after that, which was fine by me.

We joined in when we could. It was a great evening.

We were treated to traditional Berber music, by Daoud (right), and our guide Rashid (left), among others.

I’ve been in other situations where the ease with which those present share and participate in music has humbled me, and each time it forces me to ask myself: “Where are my songs?” On T.V.? The radio? The punk rock clique I was into as a younger man? The other music cliques and genres I could have fallen into had I made different friends? The folk music of cowboys? Of the maritimes? I enjoy these things but am neither cowboy nor maritimer. Where are my songs?

These young men know every word, can join in and improvise on a dozen or more traditional songs, passing the main rhythm drum and other instruments back and forth at will, sharing singing duties as needed. For them playing together is a daily routine, something to be savoured whenever and wherever they can come together in one place and time. These songs and the experience of sharing them are central to what makes them Berber.

Where are our songs?

Our last meal. Before the desert at least. Bread, tea, confections like jam and butter. That was pretty much it for breakfasts. You can see the Berber sleeping tents of the bivouac in the background. We just slept in the Restaurant, as it was already cozy and blocked the sand much more effectively.

This is just one part of a six-part series on our camel trek in the Moroccoan Sahara. To read the full story, please click here.

Related posts:

1. Sahara Diaries, Part 3: Camel Trekking and Arabic Lessons
2. Sahara Diaries, Part 5: Night of the Thousand Stars, Snakes, and other Deadly Encounters
3. Sahara Diaries, Part 6: The Lows and the Highs

The view as I wrote the first draft of this entry into my little, bouncing notebook.

May 13, 2010

As I write this we’re only about two hours into our great Sahara adventure and it’s already the highlight of our Morocco trip. We’re in the back of a grand taxi—one of Morocco’s intercity shared taxis—speeding toward the small village of Tamegroute, where we will hopefully meet our desert guide and hop into a 4WD to head into the dunes.

After scouring the overpriced tours available in Marrakesh, we decided to simply head to the desert on our own in the hopes of arranging something on the ground. That has proven to be a good decision.

In Marrakesh we found several travel agents, who practiced varying-intensity versions of the hard sell, most of which we found in dirty, hot offices. One of them seemed to offer an excellent service, but at some-9,000 Moroccan dirhams for four day/three nights, was way out of our budget. Nine thousand dirhams is equivalent to about 900 Euros, or about $1,150 CDN. We hoped to spend less than half of this.

Anyone seeking a Sahara experience in Morocco has to make one big decision: go to Erg Chigaga, near the village of M’Hamid, or head for Erg Chebbi, near Merzouga. Erg Chebbi is the common choice, and has a bit more tourist infrastructure and more operators, but tends to also be a bit more over run by visitors, which, according to The Book (Lonely Planet’s Morocco) can spoil the romantic desolation of the desert. As such, I was fairly set on making the slightly more difficult voyage to Erg Chigaga in the south. Our plan was to take the bus from Marrakech across the Atlas Mountains to Ouarzazate (“War-za-zat”), through to Zagora, and then finally into M’Hamid, where we would spend the night, find a trek operator, and head out into the desert.

The scenery on the long bus ride from Marrakesh to Zagora was unlike anything I’ve ever seen before, at times like the American desert in the Southwest, at others like pictures I’ve seen of the Nile river, but mostly wholly unique. No written description can evoke the sense of awe we felt in crossing the harsh and rugged Tizi’n’test Pass, the road literally perched atop a mountain ridge falling away for hundreds of meters on both sides. Words can’t capture the abject terror of peering down 1000-foot drops from the cramped seat of a swaying bus while the driver seemed more intent on beating his own previous record of passing on blind corners than in actually ensuring his cargo arrives in one piece, or the wonder of the lush green palmeraie (palm grove) growing like a miracle along the length of the Draa River Valley.

Our bus ride was about nine hours. This woman was sitting in front of me for most of the way. Her hands are stained with henna and, presumably, other natural dyes.

The lush palmeraies are warrens of agriculture and development, including roads, mudbrick walls to demarcate property and all sorts of clever irrigation. Unfortunately, the Berbers who have been farming here for generations are facing the same problems of heritage that other cultures face. Each generation splits their land holdings among their sons, and now each holding is getting too small for each family to live off of.

Palm trees along the Draa Valley.

Another Draa landscape.

About eight hours out of Marrakesh we disembarked with relief in Zagora, rather than going the additional hour and a half all the way to M’Hamid. The bus ride had been long, at times frightening, and very difficult for Laura, who was suffering from some car sickness, and we figured (correctly) that there would be more options for accomodation and tours in the much-larger Zagora.

Zagora is a small, dusty city that originated as a launching point on the desert caravan route across the Sahara, was of some importance as a French colonial outpost during the protectorate and now seems almost wholly dedicated to getting tourists into the desert. We were beset immediately by a friendly but persistent tour operator named Younes, who insisted on walking us to our hotel and made a somewhat heavy-handed effort at booking us on one of his desert excursions. We spent the night at a budget hotel, with plans to rise early to meet Younes and check out the other options in Zagora. After consideration and some preliminary bargaining, we politely declined, and eventually booked with a much more laid-back operator named Mohammed, who not only beat everyone else we scoped out in price and friendliness, but also offered to extend our plans by one day at no additional cost.

For 4,000 dirham (about $500 CDN), we booked a 5-day/4-night camel trek, including a brief tour of the local palmeraie, as well as an old Jewish Kasbah where skilled artisans still create jewelry using the techniques of the long-gone Jewish residents. Mohammed walked us through these places this afternoon, explaining that many people, himself included, still call this 300-year-old fortress home. Tonight we sleep in a Berber tent in the desert, in order to be able to leave first thing in the morning on our trek. As we understand it, we will rise each morning with our guide, pack up camp, and mount the camels for a three or four hour ride (supplemented with some walking), before stopping for a long mid day break, and then doing a similar trek in the afternoon. Our goal is the great 300m dunes of Erg Chigaga, some 60 km into the desert from our base camp. After the crush of the tourist hordes in Marrakesh, we are actually thankful that our plans don’t include air-conditioned coaches or loud tour groups.

This man showed us around the jewelry workshop and showroom. He was very friendly.

Some of the knick-knacks on offer in the workshop showroom we visited.

This fellow hand-pours silver and other metals into cusotm molds, and then stamps them with custom designs in a traditional artisanal workshop that has been in use for hundreds of years. Those things that look like Moroccan grilled cheese sandwiches (Laura’s joke) are clay molds for the jewelry.

So this is how we’ve come to find ourselves in the toasty and cramped backseat of what has to be the sorriest old station wagon I’ve ever been in. Our fellow passengers are three Moroccan men, who along with the driver, have said exactly zero words since we left Zagora. Some Saharian music is blaring through the taxi’s tinny, burnt-out speakers, a mix between upbeat Middle eastern techno, African drums and call-and-response singing in what I assume is Arabic. We’re lucky to not be sharing the backseat with two other passengers, as it is not uncommon to fit six in a grand taxi. As it is, my legs are basically in my own lap and Laura and I are hunched over to avoid hitting our heads on the low roof with each bump of a very bumpy road.

We are currently ascending one of the last passes over a rocky ridge of jebels before we enter the Sahara proper, and the feeling I have right now is one of the reasons I wanted to travel. It is an intoxicating mix of anticipation, excitement and curiosity, with an added sense of accomplishment for deciding to come out to this remote place, and actually doing it; getting past the touts, salesmen and shoddy operators trying to snag as many dirhams from each tourist as possible, and making it this far.

Of course, thousands of others have made this journey before us, but somehow that doesn’t matter one bit. All that matters is that in a couple more hours we’ll be away from everything, on the edge of the Sahara desert, with only the stars and the sand, and a guide who supposedly even speaks some English.

Boys playing football.

A hotel in the lush Draa River Valley. I shot these from the bus. The tinted windows acted like huge polarizers.

An old Kasbah in the Draa.

Another old fortress of some type.

These Arabic scripts dotted the landscapes in many locations. Although I’m not sure about this one, a gentleman we met in the Gendarmerie told us they generaly say things like “Allah, Morocco, and King Mohammed VI” — as in, “Long live” these things.

The contrast between the dry, the lush, and the rugged mountains were what set these landscapes apart from anything I’ve ever encountered.

Getting dryer...

This is just one part of a six-part series on our camel trek in the Moroccan Sahara. To read the full story, please click here.

Related posts:

1. Sahara Diaries, Part 6: The Lows and the Highs
2. Sahara Diaries, Part 3: Camel Trekking and Arabic Lessons
3. Sahara Diaries, Part 4: Rashid, Pain, and More Pain

Our introduction to Morocco went rather smooth considering we had spent the previous night lounging around the Milano airport unable to sleep.  Stumbling up to the train ticket office, Chris piped up in French, “Parlez vous anglais?”   From that moment I knew I would be very much lost for language, not knowing any appropriate phrases in French or Moroccan Arabic.

Dried goods for sale within the medina at Essaouria, Morocco.

As the train chugged along we desperately struggled to keep our eyes open. The landscape unfolded like the Alberta prairie. I could see for kilometres in every direction. The sky was open and wide. Field after field made the landscape patchwork quilt I am so familiar with back home. The occasional olive orchard passed, but mostly it looked like wheat and corn.

Fields of corn, wheat and olive orchards cover the landscape in the foothills of the Atlas Mountains.

Houses made of mud brick dotted the landscape. Plots of land are divided by three foot high walls made out of loose rocks that were most likely found while ploughing the land.  These hand-made rock walls stretched for kilometres in every direction.  I thought about the hours and year’s people spent making those walls, stacking stone after stone, under the African sun.

Mud brick homes are still used by many Moroccans.

Speaking of the African sun, it is surprisingly cool in El-Jadida and Essaouria, two places we visited on the Atlantic coast (two places we found ourselves daydreaming about while walking next to a camel in the scorching heat of the Sahara desert).

Continuing on the train, I noticed another natural material sometimes used to build walls were cacti. They grow thick and wide. Definitely a wall I would never try jumping over.

Donkeys and sheep dotted the landscape more frequently than Turkey. I could tell that people here rely on these animals much more than other places I have been. In fact, by our fourth day it was apparent that donkeys pulling various styles of store bought or make-shift wagons are very common on rural streets, urban streets and highways.  It is not unusual to see a man and his donkey-drawn cart waiting at a red light with motor scooters, cars and SUV’s.

El-Jadida

Our first destination in Morocco was El-Jadida, just down the coast from Casa Blanca. It is a place that does not receive many international tourists compared to the greater destinations of Morocco like Marrakech, the Sahara desert and Fez.

A doorway in El-Jadida, Morocco.

Another doorway in El-Jadida, Morocco

When the train arrived at El Jadida we were the only tourists who got off along with a mob of locals. Sleep deprived and instantly feeling culture shock we were uncertain of the money, what hotel to go to and how much a taxi would cost to get there. While standing dumbfounded and trying to inconspicuously consult “the book”, (the Lonely Planet Morocco travel guide), the locals weaved around us and within seconds Chris and I experienced our first sand blasting as all the taxi’s pulled out. Luckily for us, one taxi driver was two steps behind all the rest and he drove us into town.

We explored the old Portuguese quarters, the most famous tourist attraction at El-Jadida. The entire area is walled in with thick, 4 meter high mud brick walls, and protected by the ocean on one side. People still live in this historical place.

Within the medina is an old Portuguese cistern. For 20 Dirham (roughly 2 Euros) you can walk around it. Compared to the cistern in Istanbul, Turkey this cistern is miniscule.

In El-Jadida, street vendors find an opportune selling place and take it. It may be in the middle of the bus terminal parking lot or on an open spot on the sidewalk along one of the busier shopping streets.  Some men unfold a piece of fabric roughly 1-meter square onto the ground, upon which they very carefully place an assortment of goods including sunglasses, watches, key chains and mini packs of Kleenex. Others make a shoddy-looking food stand on wheels where people refresh themselves on what looks like goats milk. The drink is ladled into a plastic bowl. The customer drinks it or uses one of the provided metal spoons.

A man sells a milk-like refreshment in the middle of a parking lot from his make-shift cart.

Handing the bowl and spoon back, the vendor dunks both into a work bucket hanging off a metal rod protruding from the trolley. Two dunks later, without any obvious sign of dish soap and without any scrubbing, the bowl is placed upside down on the counter of the trolley, the spoon is wiped once with a reused cloth and all is ready for the next customer. I couldn’t help but be concerned that my weak Canadian immune system may have a run-in with Moroccan bacteria. (So far I’ve been going strong and healthy)

Essaouira

After El-Jadida we visited the coastal town of Essaouira where years back Jimmy Hendrix chilled.  The city was bustling with tourists and sea gulls. We thoroughly enjoyed the architecture and an afternoon lazing about on the hot sand and swimming in the Atlantic Ocean. I had a ball shooting from the hip, and I mean literally: not looking through my camera while taking pictures in the Essaouira medina (old city), specifically in the  souk (which is equivalent to the bazaar in Turkey).  We didn’t do much ourselves in Essaouira besides walk around the souk, the beach and entertain ourselves with people watching.

A man chillin’, like most people do, in Essaouria, Morocco.

A woman doing a little bit of shopping in the medina (old city) shopping area of Essaouria.

The fake spice pyramids (plastic pyramids with glued on spice) attract customers to the many scents available for personal use or to enhance ones cooking.

The medina of Essaouria caters to people of all types.

Most Moroccans go about their daily life in Essaouria, while others sit around relaxing and still others try to up sell foreign tourists on anything possible.

Another unique doorway with another man chillin’.

More shoppers in the Essaouria medina.

Marrakech

Before heading to the Sahara desert for four days we visited the UNESCO World Heritage Site, the medina of the city of Marrakech. The medina, or old city, was sporadically designed, without any obvious order. It was pure chaos and crowded. We wandered around the souk, getting lost and harassed by shop keepers wanting us to buy a leather bag, a rug, or a traditional Moroccan outfit. I must admit, we were both very happy to leave Marrakech on the bus to nowhere (a.k.a. the Sahara desert).

I tried to snap a shot of this donkey-drawn cart within the Marrakech medina souk. The young boy in the cart, got very angry and threatened me with this whip and a few words. Oopps.

Chris walking down one of the many small, colourful, dirty streets of the Marrakech medina.

The main corridor of the Marrakech medina shopping area teems with life and many, many salesmen.

The UNESCO World Heritage Site, the main square in the Marrakech medina. This square is impossible to walk through without getting harassed every few feet, from women selling henna designs, to snake charmers, musicians and food vendors. Saying “No thank you” was the best way to get rid of them, other places just make sure you don’t make eye contact.

Keep posted for the exciting photos and video from our crazy four day adventure with one guide, two camels and the wild and extremely dangerous creatures that make the desert their home.

Related posts:

1. Maroc, Morocco, Marocco
2. Moroccan ceramics, food, fashion, religion and most important, tips on how to use a squat toilet
3. Sahara Teaser

Just a quick video update from Fez, Morocco, where we just returned from 5 days in the desert, and endured a 24 hour bus ride to get here. We only have a few days left in Morocco, and we’re both quite drained from the constant travel in our attempt to get a feel for this place in a scant three weeks.

The video was recorded at the top of the highest dune at Erg Chigaga, a sprawling area of sand that sits on the northern Sahara less than 40 km from the Morocco/Algeria border. We trekked 4 days on foot to get there, over 60 km of brutal desert. This morning I finished typing up my notes from out there (somewhere, ha ha), and will be publishing those along with some photographs from the trip as part of a series of posts I’m calling Sahara Diaries. It’s something a little different from what we usually do around here. It’s a bit more personal and a bit more magazine-y. I hope you enjoy it.

We made this video in Zagora, the night we got out of the desert in order to tease our blog readers with the upcoming content and to let everyone know we were safe and sound. But after trying in three Internet cafes to get it online, we realized we had to wait for the faster connection speeds of a big city like Fez. So, here it is, a little late, but still worth a watch. Laura has some posts on Morocco in the works, and my series will start to be published in serial form over the next week or so. Check back soon!

Related posts:

1. Alive and well.
2. Sahara Diaries, Part 3: Camel Trekking and Arabic Lessons
3. Sahara Diaries, Part 5: Night of the Thousand Stars, Snakes, and other Deadly Encounters