The Sahara; One Busy Day, One Long Walk

Tuesday, February 13. Cold morning. Passable sunrise. Skipped breakfast. No exercise (read on!). Early departure. First stop, our camel ride. Everyone was very excited at first, but by the end (90 minutes?) folks were talking about home. Pictures aplenty. Docile. Unlike Mongolia, where we skirted the dunes, here we rode right up them. Very cool.

Next, a farmer of date palms. Learned a lot, such as there are male and female palms. Five types of dates. Beautiful donkey. Grows other crops to feed his family. Gave a daughter a dog shaped balloon, who for once didn’t immediately start disassembling it.

Fossils. Seen fossils, so not so much fun. Tough choice to take big rock with lots of images or a small one with only one. Went with the latter.

Last was a music and dance demonstration from old southern Morocco. Thought to have medicinal value. Some of the group got up the dance along.

Back at camp for lunch. Then I set out on a safari of my own to one of the taller dunes. I didn’t expect to make it, but it was worth a shot. Got to the base, but bailed due to a blister. I doubt I’d have made it anyway. I had a time and water limit. Great hike anyway. Nearly none of the hike was in a straight line due steep dunes. There were three camps right at the base of the tall dune. One had a wall made of water bottles filled with sand. Innovative. It was an extremely memorable two hour hike. Said hello to a passing camel caravan of Americans. Saw a pickup truck stuck in the sand. They got out before I could offer my stuck-in-snow removal skills.

For dinner we had the Moroccan equivalent of a calzone. Perhaps the first dinner that didn’t work. Dry, bland. But it was the first below norms dinner in two weeks. No complaints. The evening conversation was about knee issues. Old age stories. But we were in Morocco, so clearly pain wasn’t going to slow us down.

Today was primarily why I wanted to visit Morocco. Perfect.