Morocco - Marrakesh and the Draa Valley

Itinerary

• Land at RAK on the earliest possible flight of the day.
• Purchase data SIM cards and change currency at the airport.
• Meet in-country guide and collect transport.
• Leave Marrakesh and head towards Ouarzazate.
• Arrive at the accommodation, settle in and have the briefing and initial teaching session.

Suggested timings and locations

• RAK → 60 minutes to second breakfast at Cafe-restaurant Oued Ezzat.
• → 90 minutes to lunch at Restaurant Palais de Tichka.
• → 1 hour 45 min to accommodation in Ouarzazate. We stayed at Les Jardins de Ouarzazate.

General teaching topics

• The geographical location of Morocco.
• The geography of Morocco.
• Precipitation amounts in arid areas.
• Population age-sex structure
• Development diamonds.

Teaching resources

• Map of Morocco.
• Annual precipitation map of the Draa Valley.
• Population pyramids.
• Development diamonds from the Global Gender Gap Report.

IB DP Geography guide opportunities

• Geographic skills - topographic maps.
• Geographic skills - choropleth maps.
• Geographic skills - population pyramids.
• Geographic skills - development diamonds.
• Unit 1 - Population distribution and economic development at the national scale.
• Unit 1 - Population structure.

Itinerary

• Breakfast at the hotel.
• Visit the Noor Solar Power Plant.
• Lunch in Ouarzazate.
• Drive to Zagora.
• Drop 'big bags' off the the hotel, where you will be staying on the night of Day Three.
• Take 4 wheel drive vehicles out to the desert camp.
• Eat dinner in the desert camp.
• Sleep under the stars.

Suggested timings and locations

• The Noor Solar Power Plant is about 30 minutes from Ouarzazate.
• We had lunch at the hotel we stayed at the night before - Les Jardins de Ouarzazate.
• → 1 hour 15 min from Ouarzazate to a toilet/drink stop in Agdz. We usually stop here.
• → 1 hour 30 min from Agdz to Zagora

General teaching topics

• Solar energy generation.
• Energy generation as a development strategy.

Teaching resources

• The Noor Ouarzazate Solar Complex infographic.

IB DP Geography guide opportunities

• Unit 3 - An overview of global patterns and trends in the availability and consumption of energy, including the relative and changing importance of hydrocarbons, nuclear power, renewables, new sources of modern energy.
• Unit 3 - The water–food–energy “nexus” and how its complex interactions affect: national energy security.
• Extreme environments - How relief, climate, human discomfort, inaccessibility, and remoteness present challenges for human habitation and resource development.

Itinerary

• Wake up in the desert camp and have breakfast.
• Take 4 wheel drive vehicles for the day.
• Head south towards Mhamid with various stops/teaching opportunities on the way.
• Lunch and a teaching session at a desert camp outside Mhamid.
• Return north to Zagora with more stops/teaching opportunities.
• Arrive at the accommodation, clean up, have a teaching session and eat dinner.

Suggested timings and locations

• Desertification management on the road side outside Mhamid.
• Desert camp for lunch / teaching opportunities and challenges in desert environments.
• Drive and stop at the 'big dune' for a run up and down and a group photo.
• Stop outside Tinfu for a quick teaaching point on flood irrigation and soil salinisation.
• We stay at Hôtel La Fibule du Draa in Zagora.

General teaching topics

• Desertification.
• Landforms in arid environments.
• Tourism in arid environments.
• Climate graphs.

Teaching resources

• Climate data for Zagora.
• Geography through diagrams, by Garrett Nagle, has a good summary page of desert landforms.

IB DP Geography guide opportunities

• Geographic skills - line and bar graphs.
• Unit 2 - Climate change and the hydrosphere, atmosphere and biosphere, including changes to agriculture, including crop yields, limits of cultivation, soil erosion.
• Extreme environments - Hot, arid landscape features, including dunes, wadis.
• Extreme environments - Opportunities and challenges for tourism in extreme environments

Itinerary

• Breakfast at the accommodation.
• 60 minute camel ride through the gardens just outside Zagora.
• Pack up and leave the hotel in Zagora, heading north.
• Have lunch in Adgz.
• Stop for a teaching opportunity, Tizi'n-Tinififft, just outside Agdz.
• Get to Aït Benhaddou and settle into the hotel.
• Students get some 'free time' to rest or experience shopping.
• Teaching session.
• Dinner at the hotel.

Suggested timings and locations

• Zagora → Agdz = 1hr 20 min.
• We had lunch here - but this is an alternative we have also used.
• Agdz → Aït Benhaddou = 1 hr 45 min (including stop for Tizi'n-Tinififft teaching oppotunity).

General teaching topics

• Agriculture in hot, arid environments.
• "There is no such thing as a desert landform."

Teaching resources

• Invest in Morocco - Dates.

IB DP Geography guide opportunities

• Extreme environments - Relief and climatic characteristics that make environments extreme, including unreliability and intensity of rainfall in arid environments and the risk of flash floods.
• Extreme environments - Agricultural opportunities and challenges in arid areas, including the distinction between aridity and infertility, irrigation access, salinization risk and land ownership.

Itinerary

• Dawn walk up to the Kasbah.
• Breakfast at the accommodation.
• Pack up and leave.
• Visit the Atlas Film Studios in Ouarzazate.
• Drive back over the Atlas mountains having lunch on the way.
• Stop at the viewpoint to see the zigzag road.
• Toilet break about an hour from Marrakesh.
• Visit the Water Museum.
• Arrive at the hotel and settle in and have dinner.
• Teaching session.
• Opportunity for an evening visit to the Jemaa el-Fna Square.

Suggested timings and locations

• Meet at 7:00 for a 7:15 departure for a walk from the hotel up to the Kasbah.
• Be at the Atlas Film Studios for 10 am - while it is relatively cool.
• Atlas Film Studio → lunch at Palais de Tichka = 1 hr 30 min.
• → 1 hr 30 min for a toilet stop here.
• → 1 hr to the Water Museum.
• We stayed here - but have also stayed here in the past - both have advantages and disadvantages.

General teaching topics

• Opportunities and challenges in arid environments.
• Water resource management.

IB DP Geography guide opportunities

• Unit 3 - The water–food–energy “nexus” and how its complex interactions affect: ational water security, including access to safe water.
• Freshwater - Physical and economic water scarcity, and the factors that control these including the causes and impacts of droughts; the distinction between water quantity and water quality.
• Freshwater - Growing human pressures on lakes and aquifers, including economic growth and population migration.
• Freshwater - The importance of strengthening participation of local communities to improve water management in different economic development contexts, including sustainable water use and efficiency, and ensuring access to clean, safe and affordable water.

Itinerary

• Breakfast at the accommodation.
• Walk to Gueliz (New Town) area of the city.
• Teaching opportunities
• Glocalization experience in Starbucks and/or McDonald's.
• Walk back for lunch at the hotel.
• Meet a local Medina guide.
• Take calèches from near Jemaa el-Fna Square to the Bab Debbagh-Kawtar Gate / Tanneries.
• Take a tour through the souks, including a visit to a Berber pharmacy, finishing at the hotel.
• Dinner in the hotel.
• Opportunity for an evening visit to the Jemaa el-Fna Square / return to the souks.

Suggested timings and locations

• 45 minute walk from the Jemaa el-Fna Square to Starbucks.
• Taxi back to the Jemaa el-Fna Square.
• 1 hr of free time.
• Lunch at the hotel.
• Start the Medina tour at 2pm taking calèches to the Bab Debbagh-Kawtar Gate / Tanneries.

General teaching topics

• Cultural traits.
• The Glocalisation of products and experiences.

IB DP Geography guide opportunities

• Unit 5 - The global spectrum of cultural traits, ethnicities and identities, and ways in which the spectrum of diversity is widening or narrowing at different scales
• Unit 5 - The effects of global interactions on cultural diversity in different places: the diffusion of cultural traits, and cultural imperialism / glocalization of branded commodities, and cultural hybridity / cultural landscape changes in the built environment.

Itinerary

• Breakfast at the hotel.
• Walk to Le Jardin Secret.
• Final opportunity to shop in the souks.
• Lunch in the hotel
• Take transport to the airport.
• Fly home.

Suggested timings and locations

• Le Jardin Secret opens at 9:30 am.

General teaching topics

• Water management in the Medina of Marrakesh.