Erg Chebbi: a private 4x4, Gnawa drums at Khamlia, and a night out on the erg

Rissani, Merzouga

1. 8:45 am1

   Rissani souk on a market morningRissani

   Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday are market days and the donkey park alone is worth the detour - rows of them, parked like cars, while their owners trade dates. This is where the desert camps buy their food. Eat a medfouna, the stuffed flatbread everyone calls Berber pizza, from a bakery on the square; twenty minutes to make, so order it before you walk around.

2. 10 am2

   Private 4x4 out to the fossil beds and Dayet SrjiMerzouga

   About 160 USD for the vehicle and driver for the day. A shared 4x4 is half that and you will spend it stopping where six other people want to stop. Dayet Srji is a seasonal lake - full of flamingos after winter rain, a cracked white pan in autumn, and worth seeing either way. The black stony ground on the way is the hamada, the real Sahara; the dunes are only about two per cent of it, which is the thing nobody tells you.

3. 12:30 pm3

   Gnawa drums at KhamliaMerzouga

   A village of descendants of enslaved people brought north across the Sahara, and the Gnawa groups here play for visitors in a plain room with tea. It is short, loud, and completely unlike the hotel-lobby version. There is no ticket - leave 100 MAD per person in the box, and buy the CD if they have one, because that is the actual point of the visit.

4. 2 pm4

   Check in and sit out the heat under the camp awningMerzouga

   Around 420 USD for a private tent for two with an ensuite bathroom and actual beds, dinner and breakfast included. The 40 USD camps exist and they are a shared canvas tent and a latrine - fine at 25, miserable at 45 degrees. Two questions that separate the honest camps from the photographs: is there a bathroom in the tent, and is there power at night or only until the generator goes off at 23:00. Ask both in writing.

5. 4:30 pm5

   Camels over the erg to the high dune for sunsetMerzouga

   Ninety minutes on a dromedary is enough for anybody; if your camp offers three hours, decline. Wear long trousers - the saddle wooden pommel plus bare calves against camel hair is the classic mistake. Lean back hard when it stands up and again when it kneels. Take the walk back rather than the ride if the light is good; you cannot photograph anything from up there.

6. 6:30 pm6

   Sandboarding down the face behind campMerzouga

   The boards are free at most camps and terrible; wax matters more than technique and nobody has any. You will get four good runs and a lot of sand in places you will find for a week. Do it before dinner while the sand is still warm rather than at dawn when it is packed and damp.

7. 7:45 pm7

   Dinner and drums in the big tentMerzouga

   Included in the camp rate. Harira, then a tagine that has been in the ground or on coals since mid-afternoon, then the staff bring out the darbuka and the tea. Stay for it - the drumming is genuinely for them as much as for you, and it winds down by itself around 21:30.

8. 10 pm8

   Mattress dragged out past the tent lightsMerzouga

   Ask at dinner and they will carry a mattress out for you; every camp does this and almost no guest asks. Walk far enough that the camp's solar lamps are behind a dune. New moon and no haze gives you the Milky Way flat overhead and satellites every couple of minutes. It gets genuinely cold after midnight even in November - take the blanket off the bed, not just a jacket.