Day 1: Marrkesh - Telouet – Aït Benhaddou

Your driver-guide will pick you up with his 4x4 after breakfast at your riad. Drive  through the High Atlas Mountains over the highest main road pass in Morocco at 2260 meters above sea level. Pass through traditional Berber villages to Telouet to visit the Glaoui Kasbah. You’ll then continue through the Ounilla Valley to the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Aït Benhaddou. 

Before you start your drive toward the great dunes of Erg Chigaga you will have a chance to explore Aït Benhaddou. This is an ancient ksar, or fortified village, along the traditional trade route, and has been the set for many international films, including Gladiator and Game of Thrones. You’ll have the chance to explore this living museum as you climb to the top of the imposing hill for a commanding view of the countryside. Continue the drive through the lush villages of the Draa Valley, watered by the 1100 kilometer-long Draa river, the longest river in Morocco. The Draa Valley is the setting of glorious palm oases and ancient kasbahs all the way to Zagora and M’hamid el Ghizlane where the paved road ends. Your driver-guide will drive off-road for 2 hours through varied desert terrain to reach the camp for a sunset camel trek before dinner. 

After breakfast in the camp, do some hiking in the dunes and return to have lunch, or trek to the north to the scrub terrains with a simple picnic lunch. The driver will follow you by 4x4 to pick you and drive through  the Iriqui Lake National Park, a salty dried lakebed that occasionally becomes a wetland after heavy rains, attracting migratory birds.  You can stop to look for fossils that blanket the lakebed.  Then head off for 90 kilometers of off-roading to explore the beautiful scenery of imposing mountain ridges and acacia trees,  and travel on to Foum Zguid for an overnight in a hotel.  

After your breakfast head west toward Taroudant through the Anti-Atlas Mountains via beautiful scenery of palm grooves and acacia trees. The drive will be via Taznakht, where you can stop to visit a Berber carpet cooperative, and Taliouine, the gateway for the Jbel Sirwa mountain range which is the main source of saffron production in Morocco. Then continue along the Souss River to Taroudant, a medieval walled city known as the Grandmother of Marrakesh. You will spend the night in a guest house just outside of the town.  

Drive from Taroudant to Marrakesh via the high Atlas Mountains along the twisting road through the Tizi N’test pass, where the road is single-track in some places. On the route explore the beautiful villages of Ijoukak and Ouirgane before you reach Marrakesh.