Saguia el-Hamra

The Saguia el-Hamra is the broad dry river bed that divides Laayoune in two — the older lower town to the south, the modern upper town to the north. For most of the year the wadi is a wide sandy bottom dotted with thorn-scrub, lined by a string of date palms; in the brief wet season after a rare storm it carries actual water down towards the Atlantic.

Walk down from the upper town in the late afternoon, when the heat eases and the light turns the sand a deep ochre. Several of the city's better hotels are perched on the north bank looking down. Bring water.

things to do sight
A story
The "Red Canal" gives its name to the entire northern half of Western Sahara — Saguía el-Hamra in Arabic, the historical heartland of the Reguibat and other Sahrawi tribes. The valley is the demographic and cultural axis of the territory; even when dry, as it is most years, the wadi is the geographic anchor that determined where every settlement in the region was placed.