Agadir is a beach city with an airport, and in winter it fills with people who came for sun and stayed for the week. A short distance inland the road crosses the Anti-Atlas and the desert starts. This is the route we actually drive when someone in Agadir asks for the Sahara — five days, four nights, back where you started.
Why start in Agadir
Most desert guides push Marrakech as the doorway to the Sahara. From Agadir it works too, and for anyone already on the coast it removes a day of backtracking. We collect you from your hotel or the airport, and the trip runs as a loop: south-east through the mountains, down the Draa valley, into the dunes, and back along the Iriki river to Agadir.
The trip is Dades gorges, the Roses Valley and Agadir — 5 days, 4 nights, from €360 per person valid from 4 persons, private as every tour we run is.
The route, day by day
Day 1 — Agadir to Ouarzazate. A morning start and a stop in Taroudant, the walled town that carries the souks of the south. Lunch is in Tiout, then the afternoon takes you to the Ksar of Ait Ben Haddou before the evening in Ouarzazate.
Day 2 — Ouarzazate to Tinghir. The morning belongs to the Kasbah Taourirt, then the road climbs towards el Kalaa M'Gouna and the Valley of the Roses, where the damask roses are distilled for the country's rose water. After Kasbah Amridil there is lunch in the Dades Gorge and the afternoon into Tinghir.
Day 3 — Tinghir to Zagora. An 8am start through the Todra Gorge, where the walls rise a few hundred metres on both sides of the road. Lunch in Alnif, then Tansikht and the whole afternoon across the Draa valley — around 100 km of palm grove — with the night in Zagora.
Day 4 — Zagora to Erg Chegaga. Leaving at 9am, the stop is Tamegroute for the green-glazed pottery, the underground kasbah and the Koranic library, then the Tinfou dunes for photos. From there it is around 60 km of dirt track to the bivouac in the dunes of Chegaga, with the sunset as the reason for the timing.
Day 5 — Chegaga to Agadir. Sunrise over the camp, breakfast, then the 4x4 across the hamada to Foum Zguid and the Iriki river, and the road north back to Agadir.
What the driving is like
Two of the five days are long road days, and one of them ends on dirt. The route runs on mountain and gorge roads rather than motorway — the Todra Gorge section keeps rock walls close on both sides of the car — so the driving is broken up by stops rather than by traffic. Read Erg Chegaga or Merzouga before you choose: Chegaga is the wilder, emptier dune field, and it is the one this route ends at.
Who this suits
People whose holiday is already on the Moroccan coast and who want the desert without a transfer day to Marrakech. Families do it — the bivouac has tents, and children's pricing runs from free under 5 to full price from 12. If your dates are fixed and your group is one to three, we quote the tour individually; send the dates on WhatsApp and you get a price, not a form.
Before you book, the tour cost guide explains what a number like €360 actually covers.
Sources
- Visit Morocco, official tourism portal of Morocco — visitmarocco.com
- UNESCO World Heritage Centre — Ksar of Ait-Ben-Haddou, whc.unesco.org
