As we left Midelt early morning and the sun rose, the landscape was again became dry and barren but still beautiful. The high plateaus  are home to the nomad Berber people who tents could be occasionally be spotted from the road. The road carved through impressive sandstone canyons and past towering mountains.

It took most the morning to pass over the highest point and start the decent back down to the oasis route. Known for its pleasant palm oasis scattered across the desert valley running along side the Atlas Mountains.

This is a route way off international tourist path… most cut straight across it and head further south to the famous sand dunes. But given that we had heard how touristy it had become and it was over 40 degrees outside, we decided to skip the dunes this time. It was gonna be hard to beat our dune experience in Peru anyway!

Instead we cut back up into the mountains at Tinghir and headed for Toudgha near Todra gorge. Talk about off the beaten track… to reach our family stay we had to drive up a dry river bed!

Despite a language barrier our family home stay was very welcoming. Kids running around and life continuing around us, a real insight it local life..

We spent only one night here but it was jam packed. The husband (sum what forced) and the younger two climbed up the gorge walls on a via ferrata while me and the oldest kept our feet firmly on the ground.

We explored the gorge (full of Moroccan tourists) and the local oasis.

And for me the highlight of our whole trip was a 8 hour hike up a mountain to have mint tea with a nomad family. Although a tough hike, in hot conditions the scenery was spectacular and worth the effort. Also strangely pleasant was the fact the air smelt of rosemary the whole time as we disturbed the wild plant 😂.

Not so pleasant was the fact we had seriously under estimated the amount of water we needed and had to ration it early on in the climb. But we made it thanks to the refreshing mint tea at the top and the water holes offering cold water to pour on our heads.

The bottle of cold water and a full fat Coke at the bottom soon reset us all.