Dades Valley: Morocco's Red Canyon at a Gentle Pace

Most visitors meet the Dades Valley from a moving car. It sits on the great tourist road between Ouarzazate and the Sahara, and the standard itinerary allows it one afternoon: a photograph of the famous hairpin bends, a night in a hotel beside the river, and away by breakfast.

We would like to suggest the opposite. The Dades rewards stillness more than sightseeing. This is a valley where the interest is in the light — red cliffs that turn copper at six in the evening, poplars going gold along the riverbed, the High Atlas standing pale and snow-streaked at the northern end of the view. None of that requires you to climb anything.

The valley cuts south out of the High Atlas in the Drâa-Tafilalet region of southern Morocco, gathering at the town of Boumalne du Dadès at around 1,600 metres, then narrowing into the Dadès Gorge. It is high, dry, bright and surprisingly green along the water. Two nights here, with a chair, a pot of mint tea and no particular plan, is one of the best-value days of rest on any Moroccan route.

A little history

The Dades has been a corridor for as long as people have moved animals between mountain pasture and desert plain. The valley and the town of Boumalne are closely associated with the Aït Atta, a large Amazigh (Berber) confederation whose heartland lies in the dark volcanic hills of Jbel Saghro just to the south. Their old rhythm was seasonal: flocks up into the heights in summer, down to the warmer plains in winter, with the valley as the hinge.

What visitors notice first is the architecture of caution. The road from Ouarzazate through Skoura to Boumalne is often called the Road of a Thousand Kasbahs, and the name is barely an exaggeration. Kasbahs and fortified villages — ksour — stand in earth-coloured clusters wherever there was water to defend and grain to store. They were built of rammed earth and straw, which is why so many are dissolving gently back into the hillside; a kasbah that is not lived in and re-plastered does not last long.

The early twentieth century brought a different kind of power. Thami El Glaoui, the pasha of Marrakech who dominated southern Morocco during the French protectorate, is credited with a kasbah raised above Boumalne in the 1920s. It is a useful reminder as you look at the valley: these quiet gardens were, not long ago, a place worth controlling.

A village in the Dadès Valley, with earth-built houses set above the cultivated valley floor.

What to see

The Dadès Gorge

From Boumalne, a paved road runs north into the gorge for roughly 25 kilometres before the landscape opens out again towards the high village of Msemrir. It is one of the loveliest short drives in Morocco. The cliffs rise steeply — in places a few hundred metres above the riverbed — and the colour shifts through rust, rose and grey as the day goes on. Allow an hour or so each way if you stop, which you will.

The switchbacks

The valley's signature image is a set of tight hairpin bends climbing the gorge wall, roughly 25 to 30 kilometres up from Boumalne. There is a café terrace at the top with the whole ribbon of road laid out below. This is the rare famous view that asks nothing of your knees: you are driven up, you sit down, and the view is simply there in front of you.

Monkey Fingers

A few kilometres before the gorge narrows, near the village of Tamellalt, a wall of conglomerate rock has weathered into rounded vertical columns that everyone calls the Monkey Fingers. Walkers can follow a slot canyon into them; those of us who would rather not can see the formation perfectly well from the valley road opposite, and it is honestly the better photograph.

The gardens and the riverbed

Do not overlook the valley floor. Narrow irrigated plots of barley, alfalfa, almond, fig, apricot and walnut run right up to the water, worked by hand, crossed by little earth channels. A flat twenty-minute stroll along a garden track — no gradient, no steps — will show you more about how the Dades actually works than any viewpoint.

The Tagdilt plain

East of Boumalne, a rough track crosses a stony desert plain that serious birdwatchers travel a long way to see: desert larks, wheatears, sandgrouse, coursers. You watch from the vehicle, which makes it an unusually comfortable wildlife outing. Ask your hotel for a local driver who knows the tracks.

The Dadès Gorge, where the river runs between high rock walls north of Boumalne.

A day trip nearby

Two good ones, in opposite directions.

The Valley of the Roses, west of Boumalne around the town of El Kelaâ M'Gouna, lies roughly 20 to 30 kilometres away — half an hour by road. Damascus roses grow as hedges along the irrigation channels and are picked by hand for rose water and rose oil. Buds generally open from around mid-April and the harvest runs for about three weeks into May, when the town holds its rose festival; the dates move each year with the season, so confirm locally before building a trip around it. Outside harvest time it is still a pretty drive through almond groves, with the Atlas behind.

Todra Gorge, east towards Tinghir, is about 50 to 55 kilometres from Boumalne, roughly an hour's drive, with the gorge itself a short way beyond the town. Where the Dades is broad and layered, Todra is a sudden vertical slot with a stream running through it. You can be dropped at the foot of the cliffs and walk on the flat for as long as you like. Done gently, it is a half-day out rather than a full one.

Almond orchards in flower below the High Atlas, photographed at El Kelaâ M'Gouna in the Dades Valley.

Honest advice for comfortable travel

• Altitude is the thing nobody mentions. Boumalne sits at about 1,600 metres and the upper gorge is higher. It is not enough to cause trouble for most people, but it makes the air thin and dry, the sun sharp and the nights genuinely cold, even after a warm day. Bring a fleece for the evening in every month of the year.
• The heat is real in summer. June to August can pass 40°C in the valley. If you have any difficulty with heat, avoid high summer here altogether.
• Choose your hotel by its terrace, not its stars. The pleasure of the Dades is sitting above the river watching the cliffs change colour. Ask specifically for a ground-floor room, or a room on the same level as the terrace — many small auberges are built into the slope with charming, steep, unlit outdoor staircases between levels.
• Staying in Boumalne means flat ground, shops, pharmacies and banks. Staying up in the gorge means better views and quiet, but a winding drive to anything else. If walking is difficult, Boumalne is the sensible base; if you simply want to rest, the gorge is lovely.
• The gorge road is paved but narrow, with bends, occasional rough patches and no barriers in places. A local driver is money well spent, and far less tiring than driving it yourself.
• You can see almost everything from the road. Nothing in this story requires a hike. Decline the canyon walk without a shred of guilt.
• Carry water and a hat even for short stops. There is very little shade once you leave the poplars.
• Nights are quiet and roads are unlit. Take a small torch for moving around a hotel garden after dinner.

The road descending from the Dadès Gorge, paved and narrow as it follows the valley.

What to eat

Mountain and oasis cooking, not city cooking: straightforward, slow and generally very good. Tagines are the backbone — chicken with preserved lemon and olives, lamb with prunes and almonds, or a vegetable tagine that tastes of the gardens outside. Friday is couscous day across Morocco, and worth planning for.

Breakfast is a highlight. Look for the Berber omelette, cooked in a tagine dish with tomato, onion, pepper and cumin, eaten with bread straight off the griddle. Msemen, the flaky folded pancake, arrives with honey, butter or olive oil and a glass of mint tea.

If you are travelling on towards the desert, watch for medfouna — sometimes translated as Berber pizza — a round stuffed bread filled with spiced meat, onion and almonds. It is generous; one is easily shared between two.

Then there is what the valley grows: walnuts, almonds, dates, figs, apricots and apples, sold by the roadside in season. From the Rose Valley come rose water and rose-scented soaps, sold in shops along the main road. Alcohol is not widely available in small towns here, and many family-run auberges do not serve it. Tap water is best avoided; bottled water is everywhere.

Getting there

A practical note on the journey: the drive over the High Atlas from Marrakech is long and full of bends. If you are prone to car sickness or simply tire on the road, split it with a night in Ouarzazate rather than arriving in the Dades exhausted. Boumalne also holds a weekly souk that spills across the town — worth asking your hotel which day it falls on, as the town is at its liveliest that morning.

Our verdict

The Dades Valley is not a place you tick off. There is no monument here, no museum, nothing you must see before you die. What there is, is a valley of red rock and green gardens where an unhurried traveller is at a real advantage.

It suits travellers over 60 unusually well. The great views are roadside views. The walking is optional and flat. The hotels are small, family-run and kind. And the one genuine effort — the drive up the gorge — is done sitting down, with a tea at the top.

Our advice, plainly: book two nights, not one. Take the gorge road in the late afternoon when the cliffs are at their warmest. Spend the following morning doing nothing at all on a terrace above the river. That, and not the hairpin photograph, is what people remember about the Dades.

Sunrise over the High Atlas mountains, seen from the Dades Valley.

“Come for the famous bend in the road, and stay for the hour when the cliffs turn to copper.”

Photo credits

• Panoramic view in the dades valley 16991430070: Mario Micklisch, CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons
• Dadès Valley: Bernard Gagnon, CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons
• Dades Gorge 4989115091: Mike Prince from Bangalore, India, CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons
• Sunrise over High Atlas mountains from Dades Valley at El Kelaa des Mgouna - Flickr - gailhampshire: gailhampshire from Cradley, Malvern, U.K, CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons
• Dades Gorge 4989722700: Mike Prince from Bangalore, India, CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons
• Sunrise over High Atlas mountains from Dades Valley - Flickr - gailhampshire: gailhampshire from Cradley, Malvern, U.K, CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons