One Moroccan road trip, two women, three dogs, and a new highway through the Sahara

It’s December 30, 2024, and I’m wedged into the sofa at home in Taghazout, Morocco, wondering whether to stay here or set off on a surf trip through the Sahara for New Year’s. I messaged a friend who was already in Dakhla, a far-flung town, to ask about the waves and the drive.

His reply came, “Dakhla and the waves have been fantastic. The road is indeed long, but it’s such a cool experience.”

Decision made, we—that’s me and Lola, my beach-loving Moroccan street dog—were going.

Having studied the terrifyingly long 745-mile (1,200 kilometers) new section between Taghazout and Dakhla on Google Maps, all I could see were long stretches of nothingness through the Sahara and random towns that I believed had nothing to offer other than boredom. But perhaps that’s what I needed.

I messaged a fellow surf and up-for-any-adventure friend, Kaja, to see if she and her two Moroccan dogs were up for traveling in a convoy. Me in a Dacia Duster, she in her motorhome. We both work online; digital nomads chasing waves and wifi, free spirits that love the freedom that comes from spontaneity. She said yes, and we set off the next day.

Both originally from Europe, Kaja and I have lived in Morocco for seven years. We’ve seen Taghazout—a Berber fishing village near Agadir, on Morocco’s southern Atlantic coast in the foothills of the Atlas Mountains—grow from a sleepy surf community with a handful of hostels into a fully-fledged tourist town. What used to be sand dunes with easy access to empty waves is now a five-kilometer stretch of international hotel resorts. ATMs didn’t exist three years ago; nowadays, there are several, and ApplePay.

Admittedly, I, a prolific Instagrammer at times, have benefited from the village’s rise to influencer stardom; a constant source of eye candy ‘newness’ which makes posting and blogging easier. Having moved to Morocco for a simpler life, the things I yearned for from home in the UK began to appear: Creamy flat whites, quality surf kit, padel courts, and poke bowls. Everything is available—but with a huge serving of hype and crowds. Where there used to be 20 people at a surf spot, nowadays there can be 200. And at New Year, that number doubles.

A lifelong Afrophile, my eyes loved tracing the edge of the land, a steep escarpment that dropped off into the ocean. Zooming out, I could visualize the outline of the African continent and how all its parts were connected; we could follow that coast all the way to South Africa, where I once lived.

A need to disconnect from the overtourism in Taghazout is what nudged us to seek quieter waves in the Sahara. Kaja and I had often spoken about doing the drive to Dakhla, an ocean lovers’ mecca in the far south—it’s closer to Nouakchott in Mauritania than any Moroccan city. But until recently, the southern section of N1, the main artery between the north and south of Morocco, was reserved for adventurous 4WD overlanders, Paris-Dakar rally drivers, and commercial truck drivers.

But in January 2025, the final section of the highway, between Tiznit and Guelmim, finally opened, making the road accessible for people like us. We saw palatial motorhomes, Fiat Pandas, and even road bikes on the road. We would traverse what some call the Western Sahara, one of the world’s disputed territories; an ongoing conflict running for over 50 years between Morocco and the pro-independence Polisario Front. Morocco presented an autonomy plan to the United Nations in 2006, still under negotiation within the UN, with France only recently changing its position in 2024. I hope it will be resolved peacefully with increased awareness, communication, and understanding.

The drive is indeed a cool experience. A desert highway, mostly brand-new dual carriageway, transports you through hours of sand on dune belts, plains, and plateaus. Lonely, drawn-out sections of empty road, flanked by an eerie nothingness, home to scattered lunar-like rubble and blown-out tires resembling rubber skeletons. How quickly the eyes adjusted to the bland palette of beige sand, grey road, blue sky, and an oily mirage ahead.

“Before the highway, it was not a comfortable road for cars or people… nowadays, Ferraris and Lambourghinis can do it—the road won’t break your car!” a local friend and photographer Msaidi M’Hammed told me. “For truck drivers also, it’s easier on their vehicles and on them; less bumpy, less tiring, less dangerous, and quicker. And nowadays there are more service stations and van cafés.”

The road spends a long time hugging Morocco’s Atlantic coastline—it’s hard for a surfer to stay focused. One eye on the road for roaming camels, which were plentiful at times; and one eye for surfable waves. For any surfers reading, the stretch around Tarfaya (roughly halfway) is most promising.

A lifelong Afrophile, my eyes loved tracing the edge of the land, a steep escarpment that dropped off into the ocean. Zooming out, I could visualize the outline of the African continent and how all its parts were connected; we could follow that coast all the way to South Africa, where I once lived.

We traveled through remote fishing communities, the odd rusty town, industrial zones for phosphate mining, and kilometers of wind farms. We found a vet for Inti, Kaja’s dog, in the surprisingly elegant regional capital, Laayoune. With three dogs on board, toilet breaks and picnic stops were mostly wild. Our dogs’ natural habitat is the beach; they’re incredibly adept at finding their way to the ocean. Even if we were up on the escarpment, no water in sight, they’d venture off and come back an hour later, soaking wet and covered in sand. While we might be lost, they were not.

We arrived in Dakhla on January 2, having spent New Year’s in a basic camping compound near Tan-Tan, a couple of hundred kilometers before Tarfaya. Here, Lola chased a cat up a ten-meter tree, and Inti spooked people with her post-op plastic bucket head, bringing some life to the owner and his friends’ otherwise eventless NYE celebrations.

With no plans and no routine, we spent three weeks exploring the wilderness areas of Dakhla. We marveled at the powder-soft, flour-like sand and changing colors of the tidal lagoon. We found cool cafés, MARH Coffee Roasters and Le Passage became two favorites, to work in every now and again. Dakhla is a nature lover’s playground, its coastline created by the 28-mile (45-kilometer) sand peninsula it sits on. Highlights include Dragon Island and La Dune Blanche, both of which can be visited; the means of transport, including swimming, kayaking, or on foot, depends on the tide. We surfed when the swell wasn’t massive or blown out. Due to consistently high winds, Dakhla is primarily a kitesurfing spot.

Sometimes, we have to go to our extremes to find our sweet spot. I could handle the overtourism of Taghazout. And actually, I need it. The people, vibe, my life—I love it.

I was also interested to see how locals were benefiting from the new road, part of the government’s plan to improve links to Morocco’s isolated south. Interestingly, our stay coincided with Ryanair launching two new flights to Dakhla from Madrid and Lanzarote, making it a new low-cost airline destination for Spain.

You could see—and hear—the difference by the number of Spanish speakers ambling along recently paved promenades. And for friends running tourism businesses in the area, their hotels went from being recently open to fully booked overnight.

We discovered fast-breaking waves that challenged and rewarded us. And we found a dog walker’s paradise—the joy of watching the three dogs bounce after low-flying flamingos, splashing through a shallow estuary aflush with emerald-green samphire, while squidging the silky mud between our toes, felt so good.

We feasted on delicious fish and seafood, including Dakhla oysters, which are exported globally, fresh from the freshest waters; there’s no pollution here yet. When the wind picked up, we headed to a local spa for a hammam scrub, almost to the bone, by a firm-handed lady who summarized her life here, “Work and sleep. Safi (that’s it). Dakhla boring.” She was not an ocean or seafood lover.

Dakhla is raw, real, and spacious. I felt free from the overwhelm of Taghazout; the energy is more laid-back, relaxed. The high percentage of workers from Senegal and the Ivory Coast creates a strong African vibe. I enjoyed sharing meals with the Senegalese staff at a friend’s hotel, Hotel Fyndy, exchanging my homemade chilli con carne for their traditional ‘rice and fish’ dish, and exchanging stories of how we’d all ended up there. Their warm hospitality and positive energy were unwavering; it was hard to leave. However, after three weeks, I started to think about home. I couldn’t focus on my work—so much space and wind were unsettling. Kaya’s next stop was Sri Lanka; she was happy to stay longer.

I packed up the car, settled Lola on the back seat with a surfboard for shade, and we set off one morning from Dakhla. I took some comfort from having driven it one way, and yet, felt some fear of doing it alone. Without Kaja and her motorhome as a hub, we stopped at cafés, finding mostly truck drivers dressed in light blue Saharan toureg scarves. Having pet dogs is not something Saharans do, Lola got stared at, and I ordered a nos nos, half-milk, half-coffee.

On that long drive home and since returning to Taghazout, I’ve spent time processing this journey that had truly fed my adventurous soul. I’d reconnected with those parts of myself that live outside my comfort zone, that only come to life when I push my limits and face fears, providing plentiful opportunities to try out my intuition. Ultimately, I had reconnected to my essence, and felt empowered, energized, and strong.

However, I’d also realized that the lack of structure, remoteness, and excessive spaciousness in Dakhla was too much for me. Sometimes, we have to go to our extremes to find our sweet spot. I could handle the overtourism of Taghazout. And actually, I realized I need it. The people, vibe, my life—I love it. But I also need to allow space for my adventure-seeking, free-spirited soul to breathe every now and again. And sometimes, a WhatsApp message is all it takes to get you off the sofa and on a life-changing road trip.

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