Erg Chigaga luxury camp: luxurious and sustainable

The churning drive from Mhamid ( east) or Foum Zguid ( west) makes you feel as if you need to deserve these dunes before you see them. (Tip: let your driver arrange for a camel ride just before entering the dunes so you arrive in style at your Erg Chigaga luxury camp, right about sunset). Six medium size tents fleck the dunes, fittingly ensconced in the troughs. You really feel like you’re all alone most of the time. Two VIP tents, further away, come with their own dedicated butler, club leather armchairs and lounge- library.

Inside you’ll find king-sized  canopy beds, quality mattresses, finest bedspreads, mosquito nets and Fes – ceramic water basins. Berber rugs cover the uneven rattan floors. King-sized beds are heavy with blankets and brocade covers – necessary in the winter – and light is provided by tin battery-powered lanterns. Bathrooms are provided with chemical toilets and pump showers with hot water, everything here meant to be sustainable and ecological. 

Once you returned from the camel ride and settled in, have your dinner in front of the tent, next to the fire pit,  under the most bewitching canopy of stars. Dinner is served by candlelight, encircled by lanterns placed meticulously around the dune. Then, all there’s left to do is get inside the tent, zip the entrance and fall asleep, immersed in a silence so thick you could cut a strip through it.

Next morning, the breakfast is there to match the effort you just made climbing on top of the highest dune to take in the sunrise. Only here and now do you realize there are other camps in the dunes of Erg Chigaga. Omelette, hard eggs, home-made orange confiture, fresh orange juice, coffee, butter and Moroccan pastry to rival some of the best boulangeries in Marrakech make for a prince’s breakfast. In the middle of nowhere. One can only feel sorry for  Mohamed and the rest of the team having to cross two or three dunes for each course to be laid on your table. Before you know it, it’s time to leave. And that’s the hardest.

Best visited from September to May. Alcohol not available on site but you are free to bring your own.