A first loop through Morocco, cities, mountains, desert

Morocco does not divide neatly into a single unmissable circuit the way some smaller countries do, largely because it contains several genuinely different landscapes within a few days' travel of each other. A first visit built around a wider loop, taking in the imperial cities, a crossing of the High Atlas, a taste of the Sahara and a finish on the Atlantic coast, is one sensible way to see a representative slice of all of it without spending the whole trip on the motorway.

Casablanca to Fes, by way of the old capital

Most grand circuits begin in Casablanca, Morocco's largest city and its main international gateway, before heading inland to Rabat, the current administrative capital, and on to Meknes and Fes, the two great historic capitals whose walled medinas and religious schools anchor the country's reputation for craft and scholarship. This stretch does the heaviest lifting in terms of history, covering several centuries and at least three ruling dynasties within a few days of relatively easy travel.

Over the Atlas and down to the dunes

From Fes, the route typically climbs into the Middle Atlas around Ifrane and Azrou, a cooler, cedar-forested landscape that surprises visitors expecting only desert and souks from Morocco, before descending toward Erfoud and the dunes at Merzouga, on the edge of the Sahara. The change in scenery over these few days, forest to gorge to sand, is considerable, and it is one of the clearest demonstrations of how much geography a single Moroccan itinerary can cover.

Kasbahs, valleys and the road back to Marrakech

Heading back west, the route generally follows the Dades and Draa valleys, strings of kasbahs and palm groves built along a fertile ribbon of river between the desert and the mountains, before crossing the Atlas again to reach Marrakech, the trip's natural finale and its busiest, most visited city. Ait Benhaddou, a fortified earthen kasbah settlement on this stretch, is among the best-preserved examples of the style and has featured as a filming location in a number of productions drawn to its dramatic, layered architecture.

Some itineraries extend the loop a final stage further, from Marrakech to Essaouira on the Atlantic coast, trading the desert heat for sea air before the flight home, a sensible way to close a trip that has otherwise stayed almost entirely inland. It also means the circuit touches all three of Morocco's defining landscapes, coast, mountain and desert, within a single, manageable trip, rather than favouring one of them at the expense of the other two.

When to go, and what a first loop leaves out

Spring and autumn suit a circuit this varied best, since no single stretch of the route is at its most extreme: the Atlas passes are clear rather than snowbound, the desert is warm rather than punishing, and the imperial cities are comfortable for the walking that a full day in a medina inevitably involves. Summer pushes the desert and inland valley stretches into genuinely uncomfortable heat, while winter brings cold nights to both the Atlas crossings and the Sahara camp, manageable with the right kit but worth planning for rather than discovering on arrival.

Even a full two-week circuit has to leave things out. The Rif Mountains and Chefchaouen in the north, the Atlantic surf towns south of Agadir, and the pre-Saharan oases further into the desert than Merzouga all sit outside the standard route, each a plausible reason to come back rather than a gap in the first trip. That is, on the whole, a reasonable trade: a loop trying to include everything would spend most of its days in transit rather than anywhere worth stopping, and a first visit is generally better served by depth on a manageable route than by a thinner claim to having seen it all.