We were sorry when the time came to say goodbye to Himi, our host at Palmeraie D’Amezrou in Zagora. He always had a cheeky smile and he readily offered help whenever we needed it. He gave us a lift to the kasbah and arranged for someone to see we got back safely – promising to come and look for us if we weren’t back before dark! He liaised with Ali Nassir at the garage and, as soon as our new door lock arrived, we were there to have it fitted.
Each morning Himi came by with a cheerful greeting, exclaiming how beautiful the day was. Each evening he disappeared into his kitchen and cooked a meal for guests staying on the site. On the Friday morning he announced the day was special for him. Thinking of Friday Prayers I enquired if he went to the mosque on Fridays. He laughed and rubbed his tummy, “Friday we have couscous!”
It was only a couple of hours driving to our next stop, a lovely camp site set in Drâa river valley two miles from the town of Agdz (sounds like Ag-dooz), meaning “resting place”) situated on the old caravan route from Marrakech to Timbuktu.
When we arrived at Ferme Maison Tensift it was deserted and it was clear that they had had no visitors for some weeks. Undeterred we settled ourselves in and a couple of hours later our host, Said, appeared with a beautiful fresh baguette for us.
The area was agricultural and we enjoyed watching a group of women tending their plots. They had an irrigation stand pipe which delivered water into a series of shallow ditches and the women controlled the direction of water by building little dams and making new channels to send the water on to the next plot. After an hour or so the whole area was nicely watered. By that time they had lit a small fire to boil some water and they sat on the ground drinking tea – their laughter competing with the hee-hawing donkey hobbled nearby.
