Sahara!

Yesterday we returned from a 5 day trip to the Sahara desert and back. Our adventure was pretty much exactly like every movie that has taken place in the desert, complete with buried treasure, ancient mysteries, mysterious Bedouins, and ambushes by armed nomads on horseback. I’m pretty sure that we even saw those guys from that movie windsurfing across the desert on an old fighter plane being chased by thugs funded by a corrupt Mali government. Our first night was in Ouarzazate, where we had our training. Carrie and I, Alex, Amy, and Jeremy met there, coming at different times and from different directions. Most shops and restaurants were closed because people were still celebrating L3id: the end of Ramadan. Our hotel manager set us up with a desert guide and transport for a good price. Thursday morning, we left for the town of M’Hamid in the Saharan desert, only about 25 miles from the Algerian border. The road to M’Hamid snakes through the Draa River valley which intermittently flows several hundred miles around the back side of the Anti Atlas mountains to the Atlantic coast near Tan-tan. The valley was filled with endless palmeries where world-class dates are produced. In M’Hamid, we quickly loaded up camels and headed out about 6 miles into the sand dunes (an environment called Erg in Arabic). Our guides were nice and the weather was actually quite pleasant with no wind and comfortable temperatures. The dunes were picturesque in every direction although we didn’t have time to trek to the really extensive large dune fields farther west. The dunes covered a squarish area about 50 miles by 25 miles, although the dunes are not continues throughout that area. We reached camp in time to scurry up the nearest tall dune and watch the end of the sunset. Afterwards, we had a dinner of tajine and tea followed by a little music.
The next morning, I woke up a little before dawn to take an hour walk to the highest nearby dune and back. The sand was covered with the tracks of birds, rodents, reptiles, and invertebrates. After breakfast, we headed back to town. Camels are a lot of fun, and we are pretty sure that we are going to get one as a pet. On the taxi ride back to Ouarzazate, we stopped at the town of Tamgrout to see an ancient library that contained 1000 year old texts from the Koran, history, and mathematics. Some were written on sheep skin. Back in Ouarzazate, we had dinner with a Spanish biker named Danny and a nice English speaking Berber from a town called Imi N’Ifri (which translates to Mouth of the Cave).
Saturday, we began the journey back home. Carrie and I decided to take the Tarhatine Pass between the Middle and Anti Atlas mountain ranges, that leads to Agadir. We had to take 7 different taxis to get from our hotel in Oz to our hotel in Agadir. The next morning, we met with our neighbor, Khalil, a teacher at our middle school who agreed to act as translator for a meeting we had with a couple of members of the Agadir Caving Club (Association Sportive Speleologique: A.S.S). The meeting was very interesting and the group also creates really nice nature films about Morocco. We agreed to meet up again in the future to go caving and take other adventures. Afterwards, we headed back to our little hamlet as quick as possible to watch another episode of 24. And that was the most egg sandwiches that I ever ate.