On both the outward and return journeys, the 4Ls pass through Ouarzazate. This year gave us the opportunity to meet a crew who were trying, in vain, to promote their own ecological and solidarity project.
All posts about Ouarzazate
“The gateway to the desert” is a small red city, perched on the last high plateaus of the Atlas, and one of the access routes to the desert of southern Morocco. Created from scratch by the Foreign Legion and the French during the protectorate, next to a small medina clustered around the Kasbah of Taourirt, the city became the Moroccan Hollywood, with three studios where many hits were filmed. Its wide avenues speak of its origin, and it is more a starting point for excursions than a place to stay. Also, to live in Ouarzazate, you need:
- have a tourism project
- or work with cinema
- or be a pensionner
- and have a taste for the desert.
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There is a small French community, augmented by some Belgian and Swiss residents. The cinema has also attracted Americans and English. In short, under its quiet exterior, and despite its secluded location, Ouarzazate, the quiet city, is a place where you may like to settle.
South of Ouarzazate, not far from the Fint Oasis, the Oued Noujoum bivouac has set up its Berber tents on the mountainside. In this certified ecolodge, you can explore the region and the stars.
Ouarzazate has been chosen as the site for Africa's largest solar power plant. The Noor project, which is receiving international funding, will take several years to complete.
The Paris-Dakar raid is an event in Morocco, but a destructive one. It passes through the desert with no opportunity to enjoy it, with a catastrophic ecological impact.
Ouarzazate is cold in winter, as it lies on a high plateau surrounded by snow-capped peaks, including the very high Col de Tichka. Here we see its road completely covered in snow, in 2006.
In Ouarzazate, the cannon shots that mark sunrise and sunset during the month of Ramadan are fired from the Taourirt kasbah, so that the whole town can hear.
