Morocco Erfoud - Scottravels

Erfoud

Erfoud - We rode into Erfoud mid afternoon and looked for the hotel recommended in the Rough Guide. We eventually found it, but the description and the reality bore no resemblance to each other. It had a broken window at the front door, minimal inside lighting, carpets rolled up and furniture stacked to the one side. Someone eventually appeared and we asked about a room for the night. He seemed surprised that anyone would want to stay there, but he offered us an en-suite double room for the equivalent of £8. Bargain. Not really, it wasn’t the greatest of rooms, but it served a purpose.

I’d parked the bike on the pavement at the front door, but the staff seemed determined to have it inside the main door. In addition to the high steps I doubt the bike would get over, there seemed to be something morally wrong about parking the bike in a hotel foyer where the people were so friendly and helpful. In the end, the bike ended up in the garage behind the hotel, safely locked away from the main street.

Erfoud was, in years gone by, a tourist centre for travellers taking trips out to the dunes of the Sahara. It was the end of the tarmac road for this part of the country, but recent developments in the last few years have produced tarmac roads further down to the town of Merzouga. As such, Erfoud is merely a place to pass through, and we saw a few bikes doing just this, and it has therefore lost its tourist trade.

Erfoud

This is clear from looking around the town, where a few places looked like they had been something once, but had fallen into disrepair.

We took up the offer of a trip to the sand dunes to see the sunset in the Sahara. This was a ride in a 4x4 to the dunes, ending right beside the base of a camel-riding centre. Well fancy that - what can be better than a camel ride over the Sahara at sunset. Not a lot according to Jen, so off we went.

It was an enjoyable experience, being led up the dunes by a Berber. Unfortunately, he spoke no English, but he tried his best and we had some conversation. At sunset, he sat us down beside the camels and brought out the goods – locally found (or produced) fossils. These guys never miss a trick. We were 15 minute camel trek, probably an hour on foot, from our lift back to the town, so it’s a bit of a captive audience situation. Never fear though, my beloved wife, the hagglers dream customer, was there to spend enough money to feed the guy for a month (admittedly about £2).

After this trip to the dunes, we were given a lift back to the town. We asked for a specific restaurant but were told it had closed down, but we were dropped off at another good place. Funnily enough, our driver and the restaurant owner were mates. We decided against this place and went on a hunt for somewhere else. Having found nowhere at all, and being hounded by a few local vendors, we just thought we’d cut our losses, head off to the hotel, cry ourselves to sleep due to hunger, then start again in the morning. When we reached the hotel, we thought we’d walk just around the next corner, since we had time to kill.