Tarfaya: Where the Sahara Meets the Atlantic

Most travelers heading down Morocco's long Atlantic coast drive straight past Tarfaya on their way to Laâyoune or Dakhla. That is a pity, because this small fishing town of roughly eight thousand people is one of the quietest, strangest and most moving places on the whole southern road.

There is almost nothing here in the usual sense: no medina, no souk labyrinth, no tour buses. What there is instead is a wide beach of pale sand, a stone fort standing alone in the surf, a museum to the man who wrote The Little Prince, and a horizon where, on a clear day, the Canary Islands sit only about 100 km offshore.

Tarfaya rewards travelers who like history whispered rather than shouted. If you have a car, or a patient driver, it makes a gentle half-day stop or an easy overnight — and it is genuinely flat, which is more than can be said for most of Morocco's famous towns.

A little history

For such a small place, Tarfaya has had a remarkable number of owners.

In 1882 a British trader, Donald Mackenzie, set up a commercial post here for his North West African Company, and built a fortified stone house on the shore to protect it. The venture annoyed Sultan Hassan I, who negotiated the British out of the region; by the mid-1890s the trading post had been bought out and abandoned.

In the twentieth century the town fell into the Spanish sphere. It became the main settlement of the Cape Juby strip and was renamed Villa Bens, after the Spanish administrator Francisco Bens. The Cape Juby territory was returned to Morocco in 1958, after the Ifni conflict.

Between those two chapters came the detail that makes Tarfaya famous in France: from 1927 the French aviator and writer Antoine de Saint-Exupéry ran the Aéropostale airmail stopover here, on the long and dangerous route from Toulouse to Senegal. He wrote his first novel, Courrier Sud, out of those desert nights.

And on 6 November 1975, Tarfaya was the launching point of the Green March, when hundreds of thousands of Moroccans gathered here before walking south. For Moroccans, that is the town's real claim to fame.

The old fortress known as Dar El Bahr, or Casa del Mar, at Tarfaya.

What to see

Everything is close together, and most of it faces the sea.

Casa del Mar (Dar El Bahr)

The image you will carry home. Mackenzie's 1880s fort stands a short distance offshore, roofless and salt-eaten, with waves breaking around its walls. At low tide it can be approached across wet sand, but the sea here is strong and the tide turns quickly — most visitors simply photograph it from the shore, which is where it looks best anyway. Late afternoon light is the kindest.

The Antoine de Saint-Exupéry Museum

Opened in 2004 near the site of the old airstrip, this is a small, sincere museum about Aéropostale and its pilots: documents, maps, photographs, propellers, and the story of the mail flights that crossed this coast. There is also an aircraft monument nearby. It takes well under an hour, and it is the main reason many French and Spanish visitors come.

The beach and the port

Tarfaya's beach is enormous, pale and almost empty, with the Atlantic rolling in cold and clean. The fishing port at the far end is the town's working heart — small boats, crates of squid and sardines, gulls everywhere. Late afternoon, when the catch comes in, is the time to wander.

The Assalama wreck

A couple of kilometres south of town lie the remains of the Assalama, a ferry from the Canary Islands that ran aground in 2008; everyone on board was rescued by local fishermen. The hull has been breaking down in the surf ever since. Ask locally before setting out, as how much is visible depends on the sea and the season.

The wind on the horizon

South of town you will see the turbines of the Tarfaya wind farm, commissioned in 2014 and for years the largest in Africa. Not a sight in itself, but a striking sign of what this coast does best: wind.

The remains of the Casa Mar fortress in Tarfaya, photographed in 2011.

A day trip nearby

There is one real excursion, and it is excellent: Khenifiss National Park, also known as the Naïla Lagoon.

The park lies roughly 70 km north of Tarfaya, just off the main coast road toward Tan-Tan, so it fits naturally into the drive rather than requiring a separate journey. It protects a huge area of dunes, sabkha and a long sea inlet where the Sahara runs straight into the Atlantic.

It is above all a bird place. Thousands of waterbirds winter here — flamingos, spoonbills, waders and gulls in large numbers — and the stillness of the lagoon after the open desert is startling. Winter and early spring are the best months for birds.

Practical note: this is a wild, unserviced landscape. Come with a driver who knows the tracks, bring water, binoculars and a sun hat, and do not plan on finding a café. Half a day is plenty.

Honest advice for comfortable travel

• The town is flat. This is Tarfaya's great gift to older travelers: no hills, no stairs up to a kasbah, no cobbled slopes. The centre is small enough to cross on foot in fifteen to twenty minutes, and the main sights sit along one road and the seafront.
• Soft sand is the real effort. Walking on the beach toward the fort or the wreck means loose sand and uneven wet patches. If that is tiring for you, enjoy both from the firmer ground near the shore — the view barely suffers.
• Do not wade out to Casa del Mar. The currents are serious and the tide comes in faster than it looks. Admire it from dry land.
• Expect wind, not heat. Temperatures here are unusually mild all year, typically in the high teens to low twenties Celsius, but the wind is constant and strongest from spring to late summer. Bring a windproof jacket, sunglasses and a scarf for blowing sand, even in "warm" months. Sea fog and overcast mornings are common.
• Hotels are simple. Tarfaya has a handful of small, basic hotels and guesthouses; comfort is modest and there are no large resorts. Ask for a ground-floor room when you book, since lifts are rare. Many travelers over 60 prefer to sleep in Laâyoune, which has larger hotels, and visit Tarfaya on a day trip.
• Bring cash. Banking and ATM facilities are very limited; withdraw dirhams in Laâyoune or Tan-Tan before you come, and carry small notes.
• Medical care is minimal. Stock your own medicines. The nearest hospitals and pharmacies worth relying on are in Laâyoune.
• Hire a car with a driver if you are not confident on long empty roads. Distances between fuel stops are considerable, and there are police checkpoints along the way — keep passports handy and be polite; they are routine and quick.

Dar El Bahr seen from the seafront at Tarfaya, showing how close the building stands to the water.

What to eat

Tarfaya eats what it catches. The pleasure here is simplicity: fish straight off the boats, grilled over charcoal with little more than salt, cumin and lemon.

The town's small signature is a grilled skewer of squid and mixed seafood, sold from street stands and simple cafés along the main road in the evening. Beyond that, expect grilled sardines, sea bream, and seafood tagines cooked with tomato, pepper and preserved lemon.

This is also Hassani country, the culinary tradition of Morocco's far south. Look for camel meat, often slow-cooked in a tagine, and for the long, formal ritual of Saharan tea — poured three times, each glass sweeter than the last. If you are offered it, accept and sit down; refusing is the only rude thing you can do in Tarfaya.

Vegetarians should plan ahead: menus are short and fish-led. Omelettes, bread, olives, soups and salads are usually available, but choice is limited. Tap water is not recommended for drinking; bottled water is sold everywhere.

A view in Tarfaya, the small Atlantic port town of Morocco's far south.

Getting there

Tarfaya sits on Morocco's Atlantic coast, around 890 km southwest of Rabat, as the capital of Tarfaya Province in the Laâyoune-Sakia El Hamra region.

Our verdict

Tarfaya is not a destination in the ordinary sense, and it should not be sold as one. There are few amenities, the hotels are plain, and anyone expecting Essaouira or Chefchaouen will be puzzled.

But if you are already travelling the southern coast — and more and more travelers over 60 are, on the slow road to Dakhla — then Tarfaya is the most rewarding stop on that whole stretch. It is flat, uncrowded, utterly safe-feeling, and it carries more history per square metre than towns fifty times its size: a British fort, a Spanish name, a French airmail pilot, and the beginning of a march that changed Morocco's map.

Stand on that long beach at dusk, with the wind at your back and Casa del Mar black against the water, and you will understand why Saint-Exupéry could not write about anything else afterwards.

Casamar at sunset in Tarfaya.

“Here the desert runs out of land, and the Atlantic takes over the story.”

Photo credits

• Casamar, Tarfaya, Morocco: ElWaliElAlaoui, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons
• L'ancienne forteresse Dar El Bahr ou Casa del Mar: Houssain tork, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons
• Casa Mar Fortress in Tarfaya 2011: Bjørn Christian Tørrissen, CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons
• دار البحر، طرفاية: Omarboulma1926, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons
• Tarfaya 2: dimworld from France, CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons
• كاسامار وقت الغروب: Anass Sedrati, CC BY-SA 4.0 via Wikimedia Commons