What is the "Road of a Thousand Kasbahs"?

The "Road of a Thousand Kasbahs" is a marketing name that, unusually, lives up to itself. It follows the southern oasis valleys east of Ouarzazate — Skoura, then Kelaa M'Gouna, then Boumalne Dades, then on to Tinghir and the Todra gorge. The kasbahs are fortified mud-brick homes and granaries, packed with crenellations and towers, the colour of the earth they're built from because that is literally what they are.

My favourite single stop is Skoura's Kasbah Amridil, which appears on the old 50-dirham note and is genuinely worth the entry fee for a proper look inside at how a traditional kasbah was lived in. Kelaa M'Gouna is the rose town — if you come in late April or May the whole valley smells of damask roses and there's a rose festival. Through the Dades, the road climbs past the famous tight switchbacks that every Morocco photographer chases at golden hour.

I want to be honest about scale: "a thousand" is poetic, and many of the kasbahs are crumbling or half-restored rather than pristine. That decay is part of the atmosphere, but if you're expecting a row of polished castles you'll be surprised. The magic is the accumulation — palm groves, ochre walls, snow on the High Atlas behind you, the Sahara ahead.

In a tour we usually fold this into the drive between Marrakech and the dunes: over the Tizi n'Tichka pass, a night in Ouarzazate or Skoura, then the kasbah road to Dades or Todra before pushing on to Merzouga or Zagora. Two unhurried days lets you actually stop and walk into a couple of kasbahs rather than just photographing them through the windscreen.