3 Day 2 Night Sahara Desert Tour – Day 3

As planned, we set out on our dromedaries at 4:30am and stopped halfway to enjoy the sunrise.  We arrived back into Merzouga by 6am and had a small breakfast before we had to go pick up the other groups.  The entire day was filled with driving as it would take approximately 9 hours to get back to Marrakech from the desert.  Five people from our tour group decided to travel onwards to Fez instead of returning to Marrakech, which is a very smart move if you have the time.  Travel time to Fez from Merzouga is only about 6 hours and the group of five were given a grand taxi to travel in. 

Overall, the tour was a great experience and we were very fortunate in that our tour group was made up of really nice, easy going people.  One thing that we did get a bit sick of by the third day is the places we were taken for lunch.  These places all served the same foods and the a la carte meu usually ran for around 80 dirhams.  They always tried to give you the combo menus first, which are around 110 dirhams and included a salad and drink, and you usually need to ask for the a la carte menu.  The place we were taken to on the second day was the worst in that we had to order 3 times because they had already run out of everything on their menu.  In the end, they were just bringing any dish they had out to us.  On the last day, a couple on our tour decided to try a sandwich shop across the street from where we were eating and they met some tourists who told them that they were able to negotiate their lunches down to 55 dirhams because they complained to the guide about everything being too expensive. 

Had we known that there were different levels of camps/hotels, I think we still would have chosen to pay for the same experience.  Our group was the budget group and the range we had paid was 67-80 euros for the tour.  The second group paid 87 euros and it sounded like the only difference between their camp and ours is that they had a bed frame, whereas our mattress was on the ground.  They also ate dinner inside a tent, where as we got to view the stars as we ate and they didn’t have the luxury of a guided climb up the sand dunes.  They were pointed in the direction of the dunes and told to head up there themselves, whereas for our group, our guides actually came with us.

The luxury group that paid 350 euros had a nice hotel for the first night and also a very nice camp on the second night.  I heard that their camp even had bathrooms and showers, but in a way, I feel that that kind of takes away from the experience of spending a night in the Sahara.

3 Day 2 Night Sahara Desert Tour – Day 1

3 Day 2 Night Sahara Desert Tour – Day 2