Boumalne du Dades and the lower Dades gorge

After leaving the market, we drove through the town of Boumalne du Dades.

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We were heading through the idyllic Dades valley, with its picturesque farmland and adobe dwellings.

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Soon the landscape turned more rugged.

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Just in case you didn’t get the scale of these rock formations, here is an enlarged detail of the dwelling (or kasbah or other structure) in the lower third, toward the center, of the above picture.

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In the foreground is part of the formation that our guide Hicham called “the monkey’s paws.” Here is the whole thing:

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After this, we followed the road out of the Dades gorge…

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…and back into farmland to continue our journey.

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Market Day in the Desert

Just outside of Boumalne de Dades, we noticed some people walking through the desert. They seemed to be walking purposefully, all in the same direction.

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Surely, it was not just their morning constitutional!

“Where are the people going?” we asked Hicham, our intrepid guide.

“To the market,” he replied.

Market? We hadn’t seen a market.

“It’s the weekly market in this place,” Hicham explained.

“Oh, wonderful! Can we go, too?”

Hicham must have been thinking something like, Crazy Americans, but being a kind and polite person, he didn’t say this. Instead, he took us to the market.

And here it is: A very well-attended, very local market, with lots of fresh produce offered by a variety of vendors.

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Also, this would have probably been a very good place to buy a tagine.

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