Gorgeous Gorge.

3-26-14 BOUMALNE DADES, MOROCCO: We started the day in Ouarzazate at the Kasbah Taourirt.  It's one of former Pasha of Marrakech and feudal warlord, Thami El Glaoui's, many palaces. Our tour guide is a local who has appeared in many films. After the tour, the bus took us east on the Road of 1,000 Kasbahs. We followed rivers and went through several small towns.

We stopped a few times, once at a fossil and mineral shop that had some nice specimens, but they’re all too heavy to drag around. We arrived at Boumalne Dades in time for lunch at our next hotel, Xaluca, another gem.

We did the Dades Gorge. It’s a beautiful spot, cut out of the rock by a river and heavily settled for the water that allows agriculture. The rock in question is sedimentary sandstone, limestone and conglomerate. All of it uplifted, bent, folded, faulted, fractured and weathered. We motored for most of it, but we did walk parts where we could avoid the traffic.

Back at Hotel Xaluca, we caught Berber folk dancers, heard Ron’s last talk about an archaeological dig, Sijilmasa, that he worked on several years ago. We may visit the site tomorrow. We shared the busy hotel with German bikers and English birders. Dinner followed.


Kasbah Taourirt palace.

Cannoneers.

Palace room.

That church, top/center, with the cross is a movie set.

Movie star/tour guide.

Road of 1000 Kasbahs trip.

Fossil shop.

Dried up salty puddles.

Dades Gorge-weathered sedimentary conglomerate and sandstone looking like stacks of oreo cookies.

Dades Gorge-folded, fractured sedimentary rock. Imagining it all lying flat gives you an idea of how much compression occurred to build the Atlas Mountains.

Dades Gorge-twisty road near the top. The river is at the bottom of the shadowed cliff. The rock here is all limestone.

Dades Gorge-nomad family.

Berber dancers at the hotel.

Hotel Xaluca tea service.