By motorbike from Prague to Sahara – part 20
the city of a thousand films Ourzazate
and a hidden oasis in Zagora
Another Africa
While Ait Benhaddou is a town with beautiful scenery and atmosphere, Ourzazate may have bored us quite a bit in its shadow. It looks like a normal Moroccan city and what we liked the most about it was our accommodation, which had a pleasant African spirit, but one where you imagine lions and elephants.
Atlas Film Studio
The most important thing in the city is the Atlas film studio, where a large number of films were shot. However, when we went to visit it, it was already closed and all we had to do was take a photo with the sarcophagi in front of the studio.
Ourzazate is said to be the gateway to the Sahara, so why linger here. We get some sleep and push on, towards the desert.
Similar to the case with Ourzazate, the city of Zagora itself does not particularly impress us, but what brought us to our knees was the accommodation. We found this on booking.com, but with my own disbelief I suspected that the pictures could not, as is often the case, correspond to what can be expected in reality. Even as we approached, it was clear that there were no palm trees and no accommodation in the vicinity. But only until I got behind the closed gate that hid a private oasis with a swimming pool like something from an oriental fairy tale. And since it was Ramadan, we were the only ones here. Later, other guests appeared, but the main company was a hungry young man from the reception, who happily told us in his broken English that he was looking forward to studying and how far he would go and what kind of women he would have.
Breakfast made us happy almost every time in Morocco and you quickly got used to it. In restaurants, the selection on the menu is not particularly varied and even if you can find 10 items, most of them are variants of 3 dishes and what you liked the first week you can’t even see after a month. Tagine, tagine, tagine. You couldn’t miss the breakfast and it was an experience almost every time. Which even the local birds knew 🙂
However, the last memory of Zagora is from the restaurant. Once again, the generosity and care of the Moroccans was shown. The waiter noticed our helmets and asked where we were going. When we told him that we were heading to Merzouga, in the Sahara desert, by motorbike, he immediately grabbed a pen and started drawing a map for us on a piece of paper. We didn’t mention at all that we needed help with navigation, but we were happy to see how he would draw the path for us. It was interesting that what he drew would probably lead us somewhere on the opposite side to the mountains and it was definitely not possible to drive according to that 🙂 In this case, we had to appreciate the effort above all and not the usefulness. However, I wouldn’t want to be in the situation if we really needed the help 🙂
After Zagora, the easternmost destination – the Sahara desert – awaits us after a 300 km route. But we still don’t know what awaits us on the way…