While Merzouga draws the crowds, Erg Chigaga keeps its secrets. Accessible only by 4x4 through open desert piste, this vast sea of dunes in the far southwest of Morocco's Sahara remains genuinely remote, a place where you can walk for an hour without seeing another soul and where the silence at midnight is absolute.

This 3-day Marrakech to Erg Chigaga Desert Tour is for travellers who want the real Sahara: not the Instagram version, but the version that makes you understand why ancient caravans risked everything to cross it.

The journey south from Marrakech crosses the High Atlas via the legendary Tizi n'Tichka pass and stops at the unmissable Ait Ben Haddou, Morocco's most cinematic kasbah and a UNESCO World Heritage site, before descending toward Zagora, the gateway town to the Moroccan deep south. Day Two ventures into increasingly remote territory through Tamegroute (home to a fourteenth-century library and brilliant green pottery) and M'Hamid el Ghizlane, the last town before the open desert, before arriving at the Erg Chigaga dunes for a sunset camel ride and night under the stars.

The return on Day Three takes a different route north through Foum Zguid and Taznakht. a town synonymous with hand-knotted Berber carpets, before passing through Ouarzazate, Morocco's film capital, and back over the Atlas to Marrakech.

Ideal for families wanting genuine adventure, couples seeking an undiscovered Sahara experience, and any traveller who prefers road less taken.