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| camels resting on Erg Chebbi dunes |
Way south of Fez, over the Middle and High Atlas Mountains, is Morocco's Erg Chebbi desert with golden sand dunes amidst a rocky landscape that looks like the remnants of a huge volcanic blast. It is a land of camels, goats, sheep, dusty towns and Berber villages--and tourists enjoying the gorgeous sunrises and sunsets over the dunes.
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| rocky desert where fossils abound |
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| Macaque mom and newborn baby |
It's a long drive from Fez to Merzouga, where we took 4 wheel drive vehicles over the dunes to our desert camp. On the way, we passed a forest full of Macaque monkeys, playing in the trees and grabbing peanuts from the hands of tourists.
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| fossil hunting |
Our camp was set in the dunes, so we could ride camels from there up to the higher dunes to watch the sunset. The wind was blowing, creating enough of a sandstorm to partially block the setting sun and to make the camels grumpy, but it also moved sheets of sand along the dunes in beautiful patterns. We returned to our tents to wash off the layers of sand on our clothes and selves. I got in the shower with all my clothes on, rubbed then down with soap and water, and then continued on to myself. My clothes dried outside in less than an hour, gritty again from the blowing sand.
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| our desert camp in the dunes |
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| fossils in rock |
As all of Morocco was once under water, the desert is loaded with fossils. Small fossils are all over the ground, but professional fossil hunters find huge slabs of them which they sell for furniture and art. We visited one shop that finds, cuts and polishes the fossil slabs for sale to tourists and interior designers.
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| abandoned copper mine |
We spent a day in 4 wheel drive vehicles hunting for fossils, examining a deep gash in the rock that was once a copper mine, and visiting a small Berber camp for tea and a discussion of Berber life, mostly as it used to be. Most families now live in towns and villages, but Berber summer camps still dot the landscape. The long drought has made their nomadic way of life very precarious.
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| Berber camp |
The woman who prepared our tea is one of 3 wives of a Berber herder who recently died, leaving his wives and 9 children. One of the sons is 19 and now has responsibility for his extended family, with too few goats in the midst of a severe drought and limited education and options for work. There is no safety net for families like this. They make a little money setting up tea for tourists in one of their wool tents.
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| Berber children by their tent |
In Merzouga, we walked through the large palm orchard in the oasis. Families have small plots of palm trees. Some plant crops under their palms--alfalfa, corn, vegetables--but most just have the date palms. Water comes from a canal that runs into ditches serving the orchard. Each family gets to use the water for 3 hours a week. They guide the water to the appropriate place by closing off other ditches with dirt, allowing water to flow to their ditch. At the end of the 3 hours, they block the water flowing into their channels with dirt and off it goes to someone else's patch. Many villagers get water from the canal, which our guide assured us was clean, but the trash in the canal belied that claim.
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| hay truck headed south |
Overloaded hay trucks were bringing hay from the north to the dried-out south. The entire area is overgrazed by sheep and goats. I'm not sure what the camels find to eat, but assume their owners must buy feed for them right now.
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