How do I plan a Morocco trip from Spokane?

Spokane travellers sometimes worry that the Inland Northwest is "too far" for Morocco, and it simply is not — it just means one extra hop. From GEG I usually route west to Seattle or east to a coastal gateway like JFK or Newark, then Royal Air Maroc nonstop into Casablanca, or a single connection through London, Paris or Amsterdam into Marrakech. Because you are crossing the whole continent before the Atlantic, door to riad runs about eighteen to twenty-two hours including layovers, so I always plan a soft first day on the ground.

I land most Spokane clients in Casablanca or Marrakech and build a loop. Seven days handles the essentials — souks and gardens, the dramatic Tizi n'Tichka pass into the High Atlas, a desert night, the long road back — and ten lets me thread in Fes and Chefchaouen at a gentler pace. Travellers from the pine forests and basalt coulees around Spokane, used to big open country and the Spokane River gorge, take to the Moroccan interior fast, so I give the mountains and the dunes the room they deserve.

What surprises people raised in the green, four-season Inland Northwest most is the desert light. A couple from Spokane told me they expected to love the medinas — and they did — but the thing they could not stop describing months later was the stillness of Erg Chebbi at sunset, stars with no light pollution for hundreds of miles, so unlike the forested skies of home. So I now build the route so the Sahara night lands as the centrepiece, with calmer city days on either side.

For the way home I keep both exits flexible — out of Marrakech, or out of Fes (via Casablanca, then a US or European gateway back to Spokane) if your loop finishes in the north. And for the football crowd: the USA and Morocco co-host the 2030 World Cup, so if your trip brushes the tournament window, book early — demand will be brutal. Send me your dates and group size and I will lock in the smoothest routing, and please confirm the live timetable, because connections and seasonal frequencies move around.