Ouarzazate to Sahara, or not?
Friday 22/2/13
I was woken by the call to prayer at 6.45 am so I got up and watched the sun rise.
Suzanne and I had a very relaxed breakfast sitting on the roof of the hotel in the sunshine, then went for our morning walk.
We found the tourist bureau and checked out the points to enter the Sahara. It turned out that when we read it was about ten minutes away, it wasn't actually accurate. Well, maybe, if you took a plane there.
The closest dunes in the Sahara were three hundred kilometres away. That's a six hundred kilometre trip to see, and possibly ride in, some sand dunes. We discussed it and decided that we'll never be this close again, so we might as well go for it. Then I checked the map, and the entry point is only about fifty kilometres from the Algerian border. After checking the Australian Government Smart Traveller website I decided we'd give it a miss. If I was here by myself, I'd take the risk, but not with Suzanne.
We just wandered around town for the rest of the day checking out the locals and the stores. Then back at the hotel we enjoyed the sun set.
Little did we know what a sun set like this in Ouarzazate means, and we went to bed blissfully unaware of what tomorrow would bring.
I was woken by the call to prayer at 6.45 am so I got up and watched the sun rise.
The military families billets across the road
from Hotel Azour.
The mountains behind our hotel.
Eight am. Peak hour traffic in Ouarzazate.
It was a very peaceful time of the day.
We found the tourist bureau and checked out the points to enter the Sahara. It turned out that when we read it was about ten minutes away, it wasn't actually accurate. Well, maybe, if you took a plane there.
The closest dunes in the Sahara were three hundred kilometres away. That's a six hundred kilometre trip to see, and possibly ride in, some sand dunes. We discussed it and decided that we'll never be this close again, so we might as well go for it. Then I checked the map, and the entry point is only about fifty kilometres from the Algerian border. After checking the Australian Government Smart Traveller website I decided we'd give it a miss. If I was here by myself, I'd take the risk, but not with Suzanne.
We just wandered around town for the rest of the day checking out the locals and the stores. Then back at the hotel we enjoyed the sun set.
Little did we know what a sun set like this in Ouarzazate means, and we went to bed blissfully unaware of what tomorrow would bring.
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