Immediately when you arrive in the Sahara, for the first or the tenth time, you notice the stillness. An incredible, absolute silence prevails outside the towns; and within, even in busy places like the markets, there is a hushed quality in the air, as if the quiet were a constant force which, resenting the intrusion of sound, minimizes and disperses it straightaway. Then there is the sky, compared to which all other skies seem faint-hearted efforts. Solid and luminous, it is always the focal point of the landscape. At sunset, the precise, curved shadow of the earth rises into it swiftly from the horizon, cutting it into light section and dark section. When all daylight has gone, and the space is thick with stars, it is still of an intense and burning blue, darkest directly overhead and paling toward the earth, so that the night never really grows dark..
The Moroccan pre-Sahara begins as soon as you cross the Atlas to the south. It is not sand for the most part – more a wasteland of rock and scrub which the Berbers call hammada – but it is powerfully impressive. The quote from Paul Bowles may sound over the top, but staying at M’hamid or Merzouga, or just stopping a car on a desert road between towns somehow has this effect. There is, too, an irresistible sense of wonder as you catch a first glimpse of the great southern river valleys – the Drâa, Dadès, Todra, and Ziz. Long belts of date palm oases, scattered with the fabulous mud architecture of kasbahs and fortified ksour villages, these are the old caravan routes that reached back to Marrakesh and Fes and out across the Sahara to Timbuktu, Niger and old Sudan, carrying gold, slaves and salt well into the nineteenth century. They are beautiful routes, even today, tamed by modern roads and with the oases in decline, and if you’re travelling in Morocco for any length of time, they are a must. The simplest circuits – Marrakesh–Zagora–Marrakesh, or Marrakesh–Tinerhir–Midelt – can be covered in around five days, though to do them any degree of justice you need a lot longer. With ten days or more to spare, the loop from Ouarzazate to Merzouga (via Boumalne and Tinerhir), and thence southwest to Zagora and M’hamid, becomes a possibility, stringing together the region’s main highlights via good roads and dependable transport connections.
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The southern oases were long a mainstay of the pre-colonial economy. Their wealth, and the arrival of tribes from the desert, provided the impetus for two of the great royal dynasties: the Saadians (1154–1669) from the Drâa Valley, and the current ruling family, the Alaouites (1669–present) from the Tafilalt. By the nineteenth century, however, the advance of the Sahara and the uncertain upkeep of the water channels had reduced life to bare subsistence even in the most fertile strips. Under the French, with the creation of modern industry in the north and the exploitation of phosphates and minerals, they became less and less significant, while the old caravan routes were dealt a final death blow by the closure of the Algerian border after independence.
Today, there are a few urban centres in the south; Ouarzazate and Er Rachidia are the largest and both were created by the French to “pacify” the south; they seem only to underline the end of an age. Although the date harvests in October, centred on Erfoud, can still give employment to the ksour communities, the rest of the year sees only the modest production of a handful of crops – henna, barley, citrus fruits and, uniquely, roses – the latter developed by the French around El Kelâa des Mgouna for the production of rose-water and perfume in May. To make matters worse, in recent years the seasonal rains have consistently failed, turning the palmeries pale yellow. Perhaps as much as half the male population of the region now seeks work in the north for at least part.
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