Morning:
You’ll be picked up from your accommodation or the airport in Errachidia in the morning and, to be honest, there’s no need to rush the start of this trip. The drive to Merzouga is not a long one, so the morning pickup is more to give the whole day room to breathe than it is to race against the clock. The initial stretch of road leaving Errachidia follows the Ziz River and within half an hour or so the scenery starts to change in a manner that is really worth watching instead of just letting it slip by. This is the Ziz Valley, a long stretch of palm groves jammed between bare, reddish hills, and it’s one of those drives that are worth asking your driver to stop for a few minutes just to take it all in properly. The palms are not just for show — generations of farming communities have made this valley their home, and you’ll see irrigation channels, little villages and terraced plots that make it clear that this is a working landscape, not just scenery.

Noon:
By midday you’ll have gone through Erfoud, more or less the last “normal” town before the desert really takes over, and through Rissani, a smaller town with a history that’s easy to overlook if you don’t stop for it — this was once the capital of the wider Tafilalt region and the birthplace of Morocco’s ruling Alaouite dynasty. If the timing is right it’s also worth having a wander through the souk in Rissani, which is a proper local market rather than one set up for tourists. It sells everything from dates and spices to household goods and gives a different picture of daily life in the region than the desert camps further on will. Lunch is taken here, usually, and it’s also a natural place to notice how much the temperature and light have changed since Errachidia — even in the cooler months, the sun here has a different quality to it. From there the road continues south, and the palm groves begin to thin out. The hills get lower, the vegetation gets sparser and eventually you get your first real glimpse of the Erg Chebbi dunes rising up on the horizon – tall enough, and orange enough, that they don’t look real at first from a distance.

Afternoon:
Getting into Merzouga generally happens in early- to mid-afternoon, and that’s on purpose — it leaves enough daylight to actually do something with the desert, instead of just checking into a camp and waiting for dinner. After a little rest and a welcome cup of tea, you will set off on camelback towards the dunes. The actual ride is a little over an hour long, going at a slow enough clip that there’s lots of time to just look around and get used to how different the desert feels when you’re actually in it and not just looking at it from a road. Timing is everything, finding a good spot in the dunes as the light starts to turn to gold, and the sunset itself is the kind of thing that photos really don’t do justice to – the sand shifts through orange, pink and deep red as the sun dips and the whole landscape seems to change colour in real time. You then head back to camp for dinner, and the evening becomes more of a social affair than a normal hotel stay: music played on traditional instruments, some dancing around the fire if people are up for it, and – assuming clear skies, which is most nights out here – a degree of star visibility that’s hard to find almost anywhere else in Morocco.