Ouarzazate

In past centuries, the present city of Ouarzazate was only an oasis south of the High Atlas Mountains serving as a stopover for caravans carrying out their trade and exchanges between different regions from the desert’s limits to inland cities such as Fes and Marrakech, or to coastal cities such as the cities of Essaouira or others. This track, which passed through the oasis of Ouarzazate, was the only route for caravans that, in one direction or another, crossed the Dades valley or the Drâa valley to their final destinations.

It was only around the 1960s that Ouarzazate became known, thanks to the seventh art when the lights and beautiful natural scenery began to attract the greatest directors to make great films made in Ouarzazate, the Moroccan Hollywood, and distributed internationally. Since then, studios have been built, sets have been erected and a large industry has developed around cinema, which, along with tourism, contributes largely to the growth of the city and the region by providing infrastructure and accommodation structures that can accommodate people from the seventh art, including stage directors, actors, engineers ,... and even extras. These landscapes and settings shown on the screens will increasingly attract tourists who love the wide open spaces of the desert, the palm groves, the verdant oases, the rivers that have dug their nest at the bottom of the gorges and at the foot of the steep cliffs, the architecture of fortified kasbahs, picturesque ksours with houses built of red earth and adobe bricks, lush surrounding valleys, discoveries of the us and secular customs of the peoples of the south.

Many people think that the desert means emptiness or absence, but nature hates emptiness and in these infinite spaces she has composed her most beautiful works and masterpieces.

Ouarzazate and its surroundings are the ideal destination, the gateway to the desert to discover these masterpieces made of sublime landscapes. Welcome to all lovers of the great picturesque spaces of the desert; as for lovers of the seventh art, they will be doubly delighted by discovering the cinema museum, the studios, and the sets, which were used for the filming of great films.