Robert’s Ramblings

In this quiet moment I watch a camel handler appear from the dunes to the east, make their way unhurriedly past me, and finally disappear among the dunes to my west. This scene could be from a month or a year ago. It could be one hundred years old, even one thousand.

But the form of these dunes is not the same as the dunes of a thousand years ago. These are not the dunes of one hundred years ago, or even a year. This landscape is ever changing, always reshaping itself.


#Morocco #travel #sand #dunes #camels #desert #landscape #nomads

Moving through the dark and sunlit alleys of El Khorbat, both eyes and cameras struggled to adjust to the dramatic changes in light.

This image of young boys hanging out would have turned out very different if my camera was on fully automatic. Instead, this chance shot captures laughter, movement and fun in away I could never have planned.


#Morocco #elkhorbat #desert #travel #ksar #people #alleyways #motion #blur #desertlife #boys

El Khorbat was one of the most amazing places I experienced in Morocco. It is a 150 year old fortified village, otherwise known as a ksar, built entirely of rammed earth. A fortress in the desert.

Its internal grid of alleys and side alleys, mostly hidden within the greater ksar structure, creates an undercover labyrinth providing protection from the wind and the desert heat outside.

As we moved through the village we caught glimpses of people far off down side alleys going about their business under shafts of sunlight piercing the darkness.


#Morocco #elkhorbat #desert #travel #ksar #structure #people #alleyways #labyrinth

Wild places, and especially desolate ones, stir things deep and unspoken within us. They bring us thoughts and feelings and ideas that delight, enthral, confuse and sometime even scare.

I wonder how many lives have changed in profound ways simply from the experience of some wild and desolate place giving them some new vision.

I wonder if these people will ever be the same again.


#Morocco #ergchebbi #sand #dunes #blackandwhite #travel #sahara #desert #moody #silhouette

This unlikely juxtaposition of Saharan desert, campfire and ghostly lithium-driven illumination tells much about modern travel and exotic remote places.

Wherever we go we almost expect the ether will be filled with those precious radio waves that bring an intrusive internet into places where perhaps it should not be.

Danny and Silvi, lit by their devices, exemplify being present and being elsewhere in the same moment.


#Morocco #ergchebbi #travel #sahara #desert #dunes #night #blackandwhite #moody

The wind dropped, the whipping sand abated, and the chance for a firelight session presented itself.

As the fire banished desert darkness, haunting African voices, Moroccan djembe double drums and rattly castanets filled the empty soundscape with synesthetic colour.

We listened, we sang along, we celebrated the ineffable experience of a Saharan desert night hundreds of thousands miles from home.


#Morocco #sahara #desert #travel #sanddunes #sand #dunes #night #music #ergchebbie #jamming

I’ve been privileged to experience some extraordinary places, however the Moroccan Sahara on the Algerian border not only took my breath away with its stunning sandscapes but also left me in awe and wonder at the people who live here in such an inhospitable yet beautiful place.

We arrived here to Erg Chebbi and into a mild sandstorm just before sunset which created an otherworldly feel to this already extraordinary place. At least one camera did not survive the sunset with windblown sand doing its worst.

As the evening progressed the wind dropped and the desert became dreamy and almost welcoming.


#Morocco #sahara #desert #travel #sanddunes #sand #dunes #sunset #sandstorm #landscape #sandscape #ergchebbie

Camels, ships of the desert, were once the only way to traverse the vast desert regions south of the Altas mountains. They were built robust, reliable and dependable with enormous range and great fuel economy. They were also smelly and bad tempered but that was a small price to pay for their great value.

There are camels still used in the old traditions however the real ship of the desert now is the Toyota LandCruiser. They too are built robust, reliable and dependable with enormous range. Fuel economy is poor and their impact on the environment not good but that’s a small price to pay for dust free comfort, great suspension, air-conditioning and streaming Spotify.


#Morocco #sahara #desert #merzouga #4wd #sand #dunes #toyota #landcrusier

Almost every parent has mastered the art of flying spoon food delivery into a reluctant infant’s mouth. I’m almost certain that that flying spoon never contained leafy greens or blanched vegetables! As for raw, well, you’d have worn it for sure!

This little chick was totally happy to eat tiny pieces of a succulent plant that mum was collecting nearby. I am sure she was getting a little meat on the side but as for eating her greens, she was the perfect role model.


#ornithology #feeding #birds #morocco #travel #nurture #nature

It was both lovely and humbling spending time amid the Amazigh people of Zaouiat Ahansa. This is a place where motorised vehicles were absent, where people commuted by foot and donkeys carried goods, firewood and people. A rare extravagance might even be a rider on horseback.

When I say, “amid the Amazigh”, I do not mean in any interactive way. They were both polite and shy and seemed to flow around us going about their business as if we were not even there while the High Atlas mountain grades did not seem to bother man nor beast.

Alas we had to move on but the idea of lingering here for weeks or even months had a delightful, almost whimsical charm I will miss.


#morocco #ZaouiatAhansa #highatlas #mountains #donkeys #amazigh #rural #village #blackandwhite