Into the desert, we go!

Winding our way south from Fez toward the desert town of Merzouga.

We started our three-day tour through the Sahara desert with an early departure from Fez with Aly, our guide through Morocco Excursions tour company. Aly is proud member of the Amazigh (Berber) native community in Morocco. He grew up in the south of Morocco in a nomadic family that moved from place to place depending on the season. Right away, we knew that Aly would be able to give us valuable insight to the lifestyle and environment of the South as we headed into the desert.

Aly, Ms. Pollock and Ms. Cassidy at a pit stop along the road from Fez to Merzouga.

It's a long 8-hour drive from Fez to Merzouga, but the time passed quickly as we got to know our new friend, Aly, and enjoyed the scenery that seemed to change by the hour.

Here are some of our favorite sights along the way:

Wild Barbary apes playing in the cedar forests in Ifrane. This wooded area seems like a campground we would see in Massachusetts or New Hampshire- minus the monkeys!

Ms. Pollock hanging with the wild Barbary apes of Ifrane.

As we continued to drive through the Atlas Mountains, the landscape became less and less forested and the temperature began to soar. The views from the window of our 4x4 were breathtaking.

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(Click to enlarge)

One of our favorite stops along the road was at the Ziz River Valley. Here clever local irrigation systems honed over centuries of practice have created a river-bed oasis in the middle of the hot desert climate. In the hot months of July and August, the river gets much smaller as it winds through the greenery of the river bed. But local farmers have managed to keep their vegetation going year-round. (We passed numerous bone-dry rivers along the way, so this is really an impressive feat!)

The vegetation of the Ziz River Valley winds out into the distance, mirroring the path of the river that flows through the center of the green section.

As we got closer to Merzouga, the temperature continued to rise to over 105 degrees! Finally, we could see the golden sands of the Sahara out on the horizon. Next stop, camel trek out into the dunes...

Saharan sand dune rising up over the horizon on our approach to Merzouga.