Breaking News: White Girl Goes to Africa and Rides a Camel

He was a little stinky but still my best friend

Yes, the rumours are true. I had a week-long holiday at the end of April and spent it the way all white people eventually spend a vacation: I went to Morocco and rode a camel in the Sahara. It was awesome.

Since I was little, I’ve always wanted to go to a sandy-dunes-hot-sun-type-a-desert. I mean, given, I was imagining trekking across it with only my wits and resourcefulness for survival instead of basically dipping a foot over the border via controlled tourist attraction, but still! I think we can count it.

My childhood dream stemmed from watching Hidalgo (2004); a biography about Frank Hopkins, a distance rider and bona fide cowboy who races his horse, Hidalgo across the Arabian desert. Arabia is about 5000 km from where we were, and has nothing to do with the Sahara. However, that didn’t stop me from pretending it was me and my camel against the world as we trek endlessly through the dunes Hidalgo-style.

To be clear, I have seen a movie and interacted with pop culture since 2004, and we of course also referenced Dune. I’m not that hopeless.

Here are my three biggest takeaways from Morocco:

1. It's huge and so, so much more varied terrain-wise than I ever knew

2. Morocco has probably the nicest people on the planet

3. Camels have cute little ears

We had a guide who drove us from Marrakesh to the edge of the Sahara bordering on Algeria and saw everything from lush, green forests to red rocks and deep valleys with an appreciated cooler temperature. Along that, we met lots of people, and all of them treated us with so much warmth and kindness that I was surprised Canadians get the reputation for being nice when Moroccans exist.

When we reached the Sahara we were already one and a half days into travel and I was ready to be out of the van and onto the camel. Lucky for me, that’s exactly what happened next.

My camel was named Freddy and he was my best friend

I was travelling with my family, and my dad had predicted that I would fall in love with my camel within about five seconds of meeting it. While that was true, my dad also succumbed to his camel buddy within about five seconds.

Like father like daughter.

I know it’s a cliché, but the Sahara is something that you can’t really capture on camera. I mean you can, technically, but even in person it looks unreal, and it’s hard to get that feeling of awe in a photograph. They say pictures tell a thousand words but mine were definitely lacking some.

After about a week of slapping on enough layers of sunscreen to protect my sensitive Canadian skin, we said goodbye to Morocco and all the buddies (human and not) we made along the way. Don't tell the others, but I miss Freddy the most.