Quickest way to the Sahara Desert in Morocco

For the uninitiated, Merzouga is the gateway to the ever-changing gigantic sand dunes of Erg Chebbi or, in other words, the Magical Sahara Desert.

There is no best or perfect way to reach Merzouga from Casablanca or Marrakesh and the choice is purely subjective. Some prefer to travel by public transport, while others prefer to hire a car and travel by themselves. The ride is long and often quite stressful. Owing to our tight schedule, traveling on the road for an entire day was neither affordable nor efficient.  Hence, it was of utmost importance to us that our intermediate travels were quick and efficient.

While doing my pre-travel research, I found out that the nearest airport to Merzouga is in a town named Errachidia and Royal Air Maroc operates non-stop flights 5 days a week to this town (mostly except Saturday and Monday) from Casablanca. So we planned our travel accordingly. You can also check the schedules from Skyscanner.

After A Day in Casablanca, we took the flight to Errachidia at night. On arrival, we were greeted by Hassan from Moroccoeverywheretours. We had already booked our car with him, and he drove us to our Riad in Merzouga the same night. We stayed in the Riad Ouzine and can highly recommend it for an enjoyable stay in the edge of the Erg Chebbi.

This proved to be the masterstroke in our overall planning. We could save a day, not miss out on visiting Casablanca and got ample rest before our much anticipated Sahara Desert Safari. My blog on the Sahara Desert Safari is coming up in the next days. Keep a watch!

Traveler Tips:

There are little to no public transport in this stretch of road at night. Hence arrange for a pick-up or a car from Errachidia to Merzouga. We can highly recommend Hassan, who arranged everything for us in the desert. There is also a flight connection from Marrakesh. However it is not direct and you have to change in Casablanca.

If you need to apply for a travel visa for Morocco, I have summarized all the information here.

The Sahara Desert Safari was the second stop of our Morocco Trip during the Easter 2018. My blog post on our Morocco Itinerary will be up in the next few days. Watch out for it!