3-Day Tour Package from Ouarzazate to Merzouga

Morning pickup from your Ouarzazate hotel or airport. You drive east through the Skoura palm grove, past the imposing Kasbah Amerhidil, one of the largest in Morocco, and on into the Valley of Roses near Kalaat Mgouna, best visited in May during the rose festival.

The Road of a Thousand Kasbahs carries you on to Boumalne Dades and into the Dades Gorge, where the eroded rock formations known as the Monkey Fingers rise above the valley. In the late afternoon you can walk into the gorge or climb to the panorama point, before an overnight stay in a kasbah hotel with valley views.

After breakfast, you drive east to walk the Todra Gorges, where 300-metre limestone cliffs frame a clear river and narrow to just 10 metres wide at the canyon floor, with an optional walk along the river or up to the rock climbers' lookout.

From there the road runs via Tinghir, Erfoud with its famous fossil workshops, and Rissani to Merzouga, where your camels are waiting at the edge of the dunes in the late afternoon for the ride into Erg Chebbi at sunset.

Dinner is served around the fire with traditional drum music, under a sky filled with stars, at a luxury desert camp such as Camp Nomad Palace, where your tent comes with a proper bed and an en-suite bathroom.

You wake before dawn for sunrise from the highest dune crest, one of the most unforgettable sights in Morocco, then head back to camp by camel for a Berber breakfast.

The drive back to Ouarzazate follows the Draa Valley, Morocco's longest river valley, lined with date palms and Berber kasbahs, with stops in Tamegroute at the Green Pottery cooperative and in Agdez along the way. Drop-off at your Ouarzazate hotel or airport comes in the late afternoon.