The Maroc Challenge machinery has cranked up yet again to prepare the Winter Edition, barely a week after the Spring edition 2018, featuring an unprecedented and unique looping route, has concluded. This season the event returns to its itinerant format, which we call “The Return to Adventure” to rediscover the wonderful landscapes that Morocco can offer us, some of them new to the Maroc.

This Monday, the registration for the 2018 Winter Edition opens, scheduled between November 30th and December 8th. Among the main novelties that we have prepared you may find a new itinerary. The Maroc Challenge will start from the city of Midelt, and will transport us to Erfoud, Zagora, Merzouga and Mengoub to finish on Mediterranean shores in the touristic city of Saïdia, where we will celebrate a great party by the beach.

Being an itinerant edition does not mean that the route is free of sand and dunes, which have been the main protagonists of previous editions. The desert will be a great protagonist as of the second stage, which will start in Erfoud. Participants will have a stage crossing towards Zagora and then another stage looping round to this beautiful city in the south, in which we will pass by the accredited Erg Chegaga, which is one of the largest Ergs in southern Morocco with sand dunes reaching 300 meters.

The Maroc will then take us in a northerly direction towards Merzouga, where the most imposing dunes of the Moroccan Sahara can be found: Erg Chebbi with its spectacular golden dunes, some of which reach 150 meters, will once again be a highlight of the event . Participants will then continue north along the old African Dakar route to reach the vicinity of Bouarfa, where a typical African camp will be set up for the night in Mengoub

The last stage will take us up to Saïdia and will be just as hard as the preceding ones, taking us through the Chott Tigri, where we must be very careful with rather complicated passages that climb parallel to the Algerian border until reaching the Mediterranean, where a good swim awaits you … if you dare to face the December temperatures and time allows it.

This new edition is designed to be a great adventure and, as usual, it will not be easy. The same philosophy developed in the Spring edition will be maintained, with various routes adapted for the different vehicle categories; 4×2 and 4×4 traction. The big news, in this regard, will be a reduction in terms of mileage and difficulties for category C1 (4 × 2 cars up to 1300 cm3) in some of the hardest stages. Off-road vehicles, on the contrary, will have to face even more kilometers of dunes with the incorporation of Erg Chegaga in the itinerary.

The Maroc Challenge Winter Edition 2018, our 15th edition, will be unforgettable, just like all previous editions, but we will probably be facing one of the most adventurous editions yet.