Marrakech takes a morning. The Sahara takes three days.
Which desert night is worth driving nine hours for, and which one gets you back for dinner. What a Fez tannery walk costs. Whether Ouzoud beats Ourika on your one spare day. Reviews of every tour you can book in Morocco.
A fire in the Agafay, three days to Merzouga, the Ouzoud falls, the souks.
The four bookings most Moroccan itineraries end up hanging on. What each one costs, and what the travellers who took it say.
01Desert by dinnerAgafay Desert Sunset, Camel Ride, and Dinner ShowStone desert an hour from the medina. A camel at sunset, a quad, a fire and dinner, back in the city by midnight.
02The long one3 Days Desert Tour From Marrakech To Merzouga Dunes & Camel TrekThree days over the Tichka pass to the Erg Chebbi dunes, a night in a camp, Ait Benhaddou on the way home.
03Where the water isOuzoud Waterfalls Guided Hike and Boat TripA hundred metres of waterfall at Ouzoud, a boat under the spray, and macaques in the trees on the walk down.
04The medina, properlyBahia Palace, Saadian Tombs, Souk and Medina TourBahia Palace, the Saadian Tombs and the souks with somebody who knows which turn to take.
Agafay is an hour away. Erg Chebbi is nine. Both get called the desert.
Agafay is stone and low grey hills, close enough to leave after lunch and be back for a late dinner. Merzouga is the sand everybody actually pictures, and it costs you two nights on the road. Here is what each one asks of your week.
★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 3-Day Merzouga and Sahara Desert Tour
Agafay, after lunchStone desert, a camel at sunset, dinner round a fire. Home the same night.
Merzouga, three daysOver the Tichka pass, a night in the dunes, kasbahs on the way back.
An hour on a camelThe Palmeraie at dusk, palms and a pot of mint tea at the end of it.
Quads on the hammadaDry riverbeds and a stone plateau, helmets and a tea stop included.
All 239 trips to the Sahara →
Pick the city you unpack in. Morocco arranges itself around that.
A red-walled city with a desert at the end of the road, a medina with no cars, an Atlantic town built for wind, a blue one up in the Rif. Six places to base yourself, and the best day out from each.
Marrakech is a walled city with a desert at the end of the road.
Almost everything in this country seems to leave from here. The Jemaa el Fnaa fills up at dusk, the souks close behind you as you walk, and by the next breakfast you can be in the Atlas, out on the Agafay or halfway to the dunes.
Ninety minutes out of the medina the road starts climbing.
Everything in the Atlas →
Ourika for the river cafés and a waterfall walk, Imlil for a proper climb under Toubkal, Ouzoud for the hundred metre drop. All of them are day trips out of Marrakech, and all of them are ten degrees cooler than the city.
Ourika, and a table over the river
An hour of switchbacks and you are at Setti Fatma, where the cafés put their tables in the river and the waterfall walk starts at the last one. Steep in places, and the guide is worth it for the scramble.
Berber villages under Toubkal
Imlil is the trailhead for the highest mountain in North Africa, and you do not have to climb it. The village circuit takes a morning, ends at somebody’s house for tagine, and the snow sits up there until May.
Ouzoud, and the boats at the bottom
A hundred metres of water in three tiers, with a small pink boat that runs you into the spray at the base. Macaques work the path down. It is a long day in a minibus and nobody comes back regretting it.
Morocco’s most booked days out.
Every Moroccan tour we have reviewed →The tours more travellers take than anything else in the country, and what earns each one its slot.
1
Agafay Desert Sunset, Camel Ride, and Dinner Show
Ride a camel, watch sunset over Morocco’s Agafay Desert, enjoy tagine and couscous, and see Berber music and a fire show from Marrakech.
From · $20
Read our review →
2
Ouzoud Waterfalls Guided Hike and Boat Trip
from $17
3
Agafay Desert Quad & Camel Rides with Dinner Show
from $24
4
Agafay Desert Quad Biking Tour with Dinner-Show
from $21
5
Atlas Mountains, Ourika Valley, Waterfall & Lunch
from $16
6
3-Day Merzouga and Sahara Desert Tour
from $134
7
Merzouga 3-Day Desert Safari with Food
from $122
8
Quad Bike Tour to Palm Oasis and Jbilat Desert
from $15
The souks are a maze on purpose. Go in with somebody who knows the turns.
Fez el Bali has no cars and nine thousand lanes. Marrakech keeps its tanneries and its dyers’ yards two turns off the main run, behind doors you would walk past. An afternoon with a guide is the difference between shopping and getting quietly lost.
Every medina walk →
Half of Morocco happens sitting down, and the other half in the steam.
Learn the tagine in somebody’s riad kitchen after a walk round the market that fills it. Eat under a fire in the Agafay. Then book the hammam for the evening, because the scrub is not the treat, it is the point.
What a day in Morocco actually costs.
Every tour on the site, sorted by price. Most of the best Moroccan days come in under what a taxi from the airport costs at home.
Medina walks, hammams, an hour on a camel in the Palmeraie and the short runs out to the Agafay.
The full days: Ouzoud, Ait Benhaddou over the Tichka, the Atlas passes and the two-day desert runs.
Balloons at first light, a driver for the week, and the long Sahara circuits that end in Fez.
Three things that only happen in Morocco.
Hot countries and old walled cities are not rare. A hundred metre waterfall full of macaques, a dune sea you sleep in, and a scrub that leaves you pink are.
The Ouzoud Falls
The El Abid river drops a hundred metres in three tiers through red rock, and the spray keeps the whole gorge green in a country that mostly is not. Barbary macaques work the olive trees along the path down, and small painted boats take you close enough to the base to get soaked. Go in spring, when the snowmelt is still coming off the Atlas and the falls are at full weight.
- 1Ouzoud Waterfalls Guided Hike and Boat Trip★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 33,630 reviews
- 2Ouzoud Waterfalls Guided Tour & Boat Ride★★★★★★★★★★ 4.6 · 9,802 reviews
- 3Ouzoud Waterfalls Guided Day Trip with Boat Ride★★★★★★★★★★ 4.4 · 4,995 reviews
A night on the Erg Chebbi
The dunes at Merzouga run for twenty two miles and stand five hundred feet at the highest crest, and they are the only true erg most visitors will ever sleep in. The drive there crosses the Tichka pass, the Draa palm belt and a lot of nothing. Camps sit in the troughs between dunes, the temperature drops hard after dark, and the sky over them is the reason people book it.
- 13-Day Merzouga and Sahara Desert Tour★★★★★★★★★★ 4.9 · 15,308 reviews
- 2Merzouga 3-Day Desert Safari with Food★★★★★★★★★★ 4.7 · 12,232 reviews
- 33 Days Desert Tour From Marrakech To Merzouga Dunes & Camel Trek★★★★★★★★★★ 5.0 · 10,125 reviews
The hammam
Not a spa treatment. A hammam is a neighbourhood steam room that Moroccans use weekly: black soap, twenty minutes of heat, then a kessa glove that takes off more skin than you expect. The visitor versions add a rinse and an argan oil massage. Book the traditional one if you want the real thing, and go before dinner, not after.
- 1Spa Massage and Steam Hammam with Pickup★★★★★★★★★★ 4.6 · 2,873 reviews
- 22-Hour Traditional Moroccan Hammam Experience★★★★★★★★★★ 4.5 · 2,653 reviews
- 33H Traditional Hammam & Massage & Hotel Transfer★★★★★★★★★★ 3.9 · 1,262 reviews
Four Moroccan bookings that will not wait.
Most of this country can be arranged over mint tea the night before. These four run on dawn slots, timed garden entries, a mountain pass and desert camps that fill from October.
- 01Balloon Flight, Berber Breakfast & CertificateThey only fly at first light and each basket is capped. Wind cancels, and the next morning is already sold.
- 023-Day Merzouga and Sahara Desert TourThe Erg Chebbi camps have a fixed number of tents and fill through the cool months.
- 03Majorelle Garden Entry TicketsEntry is timed. The garden is small, the queue outside it is not.
- 04Day Trip to Ouarzazate and Ait BenhaddouOne road gets you there, over the Tichka at 2,260 metres, and it shuts when it snows.
Marrakech in August is forty five degrees by noon.
Moroccans use both answers. Go up, into the Atlas, where the rivers still run and the villages sit in shade all afternoon. Or go west, to the Atlantic wind that never lets Essaouira get properly hot. Everything else waits until the sun drops behind the walls.
The wind that ruins a beach day is what made Essaouira.
Ramparts, blue fishing boats and sardines off the grill, three hours west of Marrakech. Keep going south and it turns into argan country, then Taghazout, where the same swell that empties the beaches fills every surf school on the bay.
- 1Essaouira Full-Day Tripfrom $20
- 2Small Group to Essaouira & Sekkala Day Tripfrom $15
- 3Essaouira Day Tour with Optional Activitiesfrom $21
By place · cities, coast and dunes
By kind of day · dune, medina, kitchen or wave
Marrakech, the Atlas, Merzouga, Fez: the loop almost everybody drives first.
The Atlas
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