Of ultimate glamping Sahara style, and camels.
Hamsa walks me at a fast pace to my awaiting guides for the next leg of my journey. I've got a guide and a driver this time. A skinny, bearded smoker and a Berber, who fills me in about his Berber beliefs - humanitarians, free from religion. We bond over this.
Our first stop is a French town that looks so perfect, clean, neat with a lot of trees. It seems so out of place here that I say let's move on. Next we go to a Cedar forest to see the Barbary monkeys, again a tourist place but a livelihood for a man in traditional garb on a beautifully decorated horse hoping for tourists to take photos with him. I gave him money but didn't take a photo with him, the monkeys posed for free.
The terrain is amazing. We're on the road for most of day. We pass mountains where silver is mined, others of salt mining, gorges of verdant greenery outlined by houses the colour of the desert surrounds. We stop at a restaurant along the way for a tajine, vegetables and fluffy, buttery couscous.
And then we're off into the desert. On the way, we stop at a shop that is in a Berber tent made of camel skin and I negotiate to buy a beautiful inlaid box that turns into a bracelet. We pass ancient cities that have been abandoned, we see the odd tent and camels alongside where Berbers still live a nomadic life.
We stop at another location where there are fossils beneath our feet and another shop that sells traditional Arabian headgear and I'm told how to wrap it around my head in readiness for any dust storms that may occur...and they do.
We left at nine and arrive at the glamping site in a dust storm at six that evening. Neither camels nor tourists look very excited about the prospect. And even though I have severe FOMO, I decide against it. Instead I'm taken to the main tent of red and white strips where I'm given mint tea, biscuits and nuts, a much better proposition than the dust stormed camel safari.
AsAfter I've been fed, I'm shown my tent. My scarf comes in handy as I brave the sandy wind. It's huge, big queen sized bed, bathroom. The sandstorm is dying down and I venture out. Red carpets have been laid out, tables and chairs perched on a small dune. How civilised! I am enchanted and happy with my choice of staying here as when the windswept, sand blasted camel riders appear, I am justified.
The wind drops, the rain comes and leaves and then somewhere, crickets begin to sing. This place is extraordinary to an outsider.
Dinner is guess what? Tajines and vegetables. I notice that the tourists have come prepared and brought their own alcohol. The Japanese girl next to me, and I, sip on our mint tea and edit our photos.
And then the magic begins. We emerge from the dining tent via beautiful carpets that lead us to a big fire pit with strange musical instruments surrounding it and then the music begins. The man who was originally going to be my guide sweeps up to introduce himself, dressed in a white robe, perfectly coiffed hair, with an air of a whirling dervish about him. He's brought his three year old nephew with him who doesn't like the deep beats of the drums and other instruments, and ends up sitting alone with his hands over his ears. We exchange smiles. We sit on coloured puffballs and listen.
The musicians are dressed Berber style and the music is wild and haunting. Mohammed is a Berber and as a child lived in the desert, his parents moved to the city eventually but on the edge of the desert. He tells of the movement in their lives as they changed locations for their animals. I am beginning to imagine what it might be like having been a gypsy these last eight months and loving it.
Then the moon comes out, fulsome and soft in the still darkening inky blue sky and Mohammed gets up to dance. He shows me how the Arab women make that wild sound as they scrunch up their kaftans near their hips and then he pulls me up to do the same. The beat of the drums, the wild sounds of the Berber instruments, the firelight flickering brings out a part of me that I didn't know existed. We all become a little wild, bare foot and primitive beneath the moonlit sky.
The next morning, we're woken pre dawn for the camel ride. They've got the numbers wrong so there's one less camel and as I'm slightly worried about my back, I choose to walk alongside them. I actually get a better view of the camel leader who is very handsome, so all good.
The dunes are softened swirls with hard edges rising and falling in the early morning light. We sit on a high peak and wait for the sun to arise. There's a slight mist so it's not as dramatic but worth the wait. The girl I let ride my camel, insists I return on hers so I courageously mount my steed with it's long eyelashes and ride back to our campsite for breakfast and another long day in the car.
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