What is the southern oasis / Draa Valley route like?

The Draa is my quiet recommendation for travellers who want the south without the long haul to Merzouga. From Ouarzazate you cross the Tizi n'Tinifift pass and drop into the valley at Agdz, and from there the road simply unspools alongside the Draa — Morocco's longest river — through what is essentially a single 160-kilometre ribbon of palm groves. It is one of the most beautiful drives in the country and almost nobody rushing to the big dunes ever sees it.

What strikes everyone is the density of kasbahs. Old fortified family compounds in pink and ochre mud-brick stand every few kilometres, some crumbling, some restored as guesthouses, half-hidden among hundreds of thousands of date palms. We stop at Tamnougalt near Agdz, a particularly photogenic ksar where a local family will walk you through the cool, dark passages and explain how the irrigation channels still divide the water as they have for centuries.

Zagora, about four hours from Ouarzazate with stops, is the valley's main town and the famous "Timbuktu 52 days" camel-caravan signpost. Its dunes are modest compared to Erg Chebbi, but the trade-off is access — you can be riding camels into them within twenty minutes, which makes the Draa ideal for shorter trips or families who do not want two days in the car each way.

If you have the appetite, continue another two hours to M'Hamid, the literal end of the tarmac, where the Sahara proper begins and the Erg Chigaga dunes lie beyond by 4x4. I love overnighting in a Draa kasbah-guesthouse rather than pushing through — sitting on a roof terrace at dusk as the call to prayer drifts across the palmeraie is, for me, the truest taste of the Moroccan south.