Erg Chebbi
We could see the mountainous sand dunes off in the distance. The dunes reach a height of up to 150 meters and spans an area of 50 kilometers from north to south and 5-10 kilometers from east to west. That is a lot of shifting sand!
Once in the village we had only a short bathroom break before getting onto our dromedary (a camel of western Asia and northern Africa that has one hump on its back). We were told to bring only one small bag of overnight essentials. I brought some drinking water for the ride and my camera. I was cautioned about the fine sand getting into the camera and possibly ruining it. I kept it in a large ziplock bag as much as I could, but when we returned to Canada I did have to have it serviced due to some sand that did sneak in.
Truly a creature adapted for desert life, camels (dromedaries) have been the ships of the desert for more than 3500 years. Their wide flat feet prevent them from sinking into the sand. Their left right stride also helps with them from sinking. They have a double row of very long eyelashes and a clear inner eyelid which protects the eye from sandstorms while still allowing enough light to see. They have hairs in the openings of their ears to prevent sand from filling them. They can close their nostrils. Their humps do not store water, but fat. It is their kidneys and intestines that can hold the water and allow them to go without drinking for long periods. Their thick coats reflect the sunlight and keeps them from overheating. Their long legs keep their bodies away from the hot ground, further allowing them to keep cool. They can withstand -29 degrees Celsius to +49 degrees. And they can live to be 80 years old. Amazing animals!
Camels have to be the most uncomfortable creature to ride. Unlike a horse that moves its legs in a 1-2-3-4 pattern (left hind leg, left front foot, right hind leg, right front foot) the dromedary moves in a 1-2 pattern (both left legs then both right legs). This makes for side to side swaying while simultaneously swaying forward and back. There are no stirrups on the saddles so one really has to hang on to either the bar jutting up from the saddle or squeeze with the legs, or just balance as best as one can. Considering a camel can grow up to 7 feet tall at the hump and the hump itself can be 30 inches tall, at times that balancing act feels like trying to balance an egg on end.
To make the ride even more interesting, camels make a lot of noise. They moan, groan, bleat, bellow and roar. But mostly they make a low rumbling growl that sounds like they ate something really bad. It is a bit disconcerting when the camel in front of you makes one of these growling sounds. You just hope that is not what it is and he does not decide to let loose from his back side since we were all strung together with less than a meter of rope between us.
There was a fellow on our tour who was proudly homosexual. He was gushing with praises for his 'dromedeene'. We jokingly referred to them as the dromedeene and the drama-queen, as he usually wore flowing robes – even into the desert.
Arriving late actually worked in our favor as we headed into the desert with the setting sun turning the dunes into a beautiful reddish tone. The long shadows cast against the dunes made for a very surreal experience. Our guide was dressed in Berber attire. It did not take us long to appreciate his guiding skills. We would have been hopelessly lost with the rippling sand, the high dunes and occasional animal track our only landmarks and our only sense of direction from the quickly setting sun. How these guides know exactly where to find the camp was amazing. After over an hour we came over a dune and there was our camp, down in a hollow. We got a real sense of just how high the dunes were, because the camp looked very small and very far away.
We dismounted our kneeling camels a fair distance from the camp. The camels were then hobbled for the night, to keep them from wandering off. This was just a rope on the foreleg put above the "knee" (the bend with the callous in the middle of the leg) when the camel was laying down and the leg was doubled over.
The camp was a series of square tents laid out in a circular pattern – reminding us of the old western wagon trains. A few of us headed up the ridge of the top of the very high dune beside the camp for a view of whatever there was to see.
Although the incline did not seem very steep, the soft sand made it very difficult to climb. Our feet kept sliding back down only centimeters from where it started. Some of the younger people ran, but their feet were sinking into the sand and they struggled as one would trying to run in water. I finally went on all fours, using my hands and feet to crawl up. The dune was very high and once again our camp seemed to shrink into the hollow. We could see the lights of a village in the distance. Other than that, all we could see was an ocean expanse of waves of sand casting beautiful shadows in the last remnants of dusk. The sand was remarkably cool and the air was getting down right cold. Rather than climbing back down the ridge we slid down the face of the dune, on our butts, like kids on a snow hill. It was not as smooth as a snow hill, but a unique experience none the less.
Back in the camp the guides put on a little musical show for us. In days of old, the caravan people had to improvise their musical instruments and make their music with whatever they had. Our guides beat out a rhythm using a drum, an empty water jug, and a roasting pan while singing songs in the dim lamplight. Someone suggested we each sing the national anthem from our home countries. It was a lovely way to show our geographical diversity. Our group had a tajine dinner in one of the tents before heading to bed. The stars were absolutely brilliant, with no street lights or smog to diminish them.
We shared a tent with the same couple who made such a fuss over paying the guide in Ait Ben Haddou. We slept on cots covered with heavy blankets. The other couple thought it would get hot in the tent so they flipped the tent flap open. Shortly after I heard them sleeping, I got up and closed the tent flap as the desert air was very cold. My little thermometer read only a few degrees above zero. Not only that, we were told to keep the flap shut in order to keep any night creatures out of the tent. We could hear animals howling and scurrying about.
The next morning we were awaken early to so we could watch the sunrise. We climbed the same dune as the night before. There were lots of people on other dunes doing the same. Where did they come from? We didn't see any other caravans when we were traveling. Only when the sun actually came up could we see other camps in other hollows. We didn't see them the night before because, like us, they only had dim lamps in their camps.
We got back on our camels and headed back to the village. The bus was going back to Marrakech but we wanted to go to Fez.
We had asked several people from Marrakech to Merzouga what the going rate for a taxi would be. We knew it would be much more expensive than taking a bus or train, but the bus and train schedules were not fitting into our time-line. A young couple from Germany also wanted to get to Fez quickly. They were on a much tighter budget as they were students. We offered to let them share a taxi with us. They told us the maximum they could afford, and making it very clear that if the taxi was more than that amount they would have no choice but to take public transportation, despite the delay. We arranged with our surly bus driver to have a taxi meet us in Merzouga. After some negotiating, the taxi driver agreed on a price – much more than what we were told from the many people we had asked and more than the young couple could afford. We offered to pay the difference for them. In the end, they got to Fez quickly, we had company for the trip, and they covered part of the taxi fare for us.
The taxi itself was interesting. It had wooden door handles and a fur on the dash.
We saw some very exciting landscape on our 7 hour journey through the High and Middle Atlas Mountain ranges. Yes, SEVEN hours. We stopped for breaks every now and then, but basically we kept driving. We saw some monkeys in a forested region. We saw a large lake. But mostly we saw mountains and valleys.
