7-Day High Atlas & Sahara Birding Tour from Marrakech

Your driver-guide collects you early from your riad in Marrakech for a day in the High Atlas. The road follows the Ourika Valley, where walnut and poplar woods hold Levaillant's Woodpecker, African Chaffinch and Moussier's Redstart, before climbing to the plateau of Oukaimeden at about 2,600 metres.

Around the high meadows and boulder fields you look for the specialities of the mountains: Crimson-winged Finch, Alpine and Red-billed Choughs, the Atlas race of Horned Lark, Rock Sparrow and, from spring to late summer, Atlas Wheatear and Water Pipit. Prehistoric rock engravings are scattered among the stones.

In the afternoon you drive back down the valley to Marrakech, with stops for any birds along the way, and return to your riad in the early evening.

Today you cross the High Atlas by the Tizi n'Tichka pass. On the way up, the juniper scrub and rocky slopes are the place to look for Tristram's Warbler, Barbary Partridge, Moussier's Redstart and Rock Bunting, with raptors soaring along the ridges.

On the southern side you stop at Ait Ben Haddou, the UNESCO-listed ksar, where House Buntings and Crag Martins nest among the earthen walls, and the riverbed attracts wagtails and wheatears.

In the late afternoon you visit the shores of the El Mansour Eddahbi reservoir near Ouarzazate, good for Ruddy Shelduck, herons, gulls and waders, before checking in to a kasbah-style hotel.

Heading east, you stop in the palm grove of Skoura, where the gardens and irrigation channels hold Common Bulbul, Laughing Dove, Hoopoe and warblers, and Blue-cheeked Bee-eaters sometimes pass in spring.

After lunch in Boumalne Dades you explore the Tagdilt track, a stony steppe south-east of the town famous among birders for its larks. Thick-billed, Temminck's, Greater and Lesser Short-toed Larks can all be found here, together with Red-rumped Wheatear, Cream-coloured Courser, Black-bellied Sandgrouse and Long-legged Buzzard.

You spend the night in a kasbah-style guesthouse in the Dades Valley, ready for another early start on the plateau.

The morning starts at dawn on the Tagdilt plateau, when the larks are singing and easiest to see. It is also the best time for sandgrouse flying to drink and for Cream-coloured Coursers running between the stones.

Driving east, you stop at the Todra Gorge, where Pale Crag Martins and Rock Doves nest on the cliffs, Blue Rock Thrushes sing from the walls and Bonelli's Eagles sometimes hunt over the canyon.

The road then crosses the hamada past Tinejdad and Erfoud, with stops for Desert, White-crowned and Maghreb Wheatears, and reaches Merzouga in the late afternoon. Here camels are ready to take you over the dunes at sunset to your camp, where dinner is cooked over the campfire and the evening ends with the rhythm of Berber drums. Your bed tonight is in a mid-range luxury desert camp (luxury camp on request).

You are out at dawn among the dunes of Erg Chebbi, when the desert is cool and full of song. Your driver-guide takes you by 4x4 to the tamarisk scrub and palm gardens at the edge of the sand, where Desert Sparrow, Fulvous Babbler and African Desert Warbler live, and to pools where sandgrouse may fly in to drink.

As the morning warms up you move onto the stony hamada, where Greater Hoopoe-Lark displays in spring, Cream-coloured Coursers run between the stones and Bar-tailed Larks feed in the open. The middle of the day is for resting in the shade of your guesthouse.

In the cooler hours of the afternoon you visit rocky outcrops used by the Pharaoh Eagle-Owl, approached quietly so as not to disturb the birds, and from spring to early autumn you wait at dusk for Egyptian Nightjar.

After a final early walk at the edge of the dunes, you head west through Rissani into the Maider, the wide desert basin between the Tafilalet and the Anti-Atlas.

The long road through Alnif and Tazzarine crosses some of the quietest country in Morocco. Stops at acacia-lined wadis and stony plains can produce Desert Lark, Bar-tailed Lark, Brown-necked Raven, Blackstart and Desert Grey Shrike.

By late afternoon you reach Ouarzazate and check in to a kasbah-style hotel for the night.

An early visit to the El Mansour Eddahbi reservoir gives a last chance for Ruddy Shelduck and waterbirds before you turn north towards the mountains.

Crossing the High Atlas by the Tizi n'Tichka, you stop in the scrub and the walnut groves of the northern slopes, where Levaillant's Woodpecker, Tristram's Warbler and Barbary Partridge may be found.

You reach Marrakech in the afternoon and check in to your riad in the medina.

This evening your driver says farewell at your hotel in Marrakech, the final stop of the tour. Airport transfers and extra nights are easy to arrange.