How do I plan a Morocco trip on a tight budget?

When travellers tell me they want Morocco on a shoestring, I always start with timing, because it quietly decides everything else. Come in January, February or late November and the same riad room that costs 1,200 dirhams at Easter drops to 500 or 600, guides have empty diaries and negotiate, and flights from Europe fall to bargain levels. I have planned beautiful week-long trips for people in winter for less than half what the identical itinerary would cost in spring, simply because the calendar was on their side.

The single biggest budget lever after dates is transport. A private driver for a week is wonderful but expensive; the train network between Marrakech, Casablanca, Rabat and Fes is comfortable, punctual and astonishingly cheap — second class from Marrakech to Casablanca is a few pounds. Between smaller towns, shared grand taxis (the old Mercedes that leave when full) cost a fraction of a private transfer. I tell budget clients to do the cities by train and save a hired car only for the one leg that truly needs it, the desert.

For the Sahara, do not assume you must skip it. A shared group desert tour from Marrakech — three days, two nights, including the camp, dinners and a camel ride — is one of the best-value experiences in the country, often well under 1,500 dirhams per person. You give up the privacy of your own vehicle, but you gain the saving and usually a fun mix of fellow travellers. Pick an operator with recent, specific reviews so the "camp" is the real thing and not a sad row of tents by the road.

Then it is the daily small stuff, where Morocco is naturally kind to a tight budget. Eat where the medina workers eat — a bowl of harira soup, a bread-and-tagine lunch or a grilled-sardine plate costs almost nothing and is often the best food you will have. Drink mint tea rather than imported drinks, buy fruit and pastries from the souk, and treat the carpet shops as theatre rather than obligation. Free pleasures carry the trip: getting lost in the medina, sunset from a rooftop, the call to prayer, the gardens. Plan around those and the budget version of Morocco rarely feels like a compromise.