Morocco: land of scented candles and scatter cushions

Candles I'd never seen so many. Big, tapered cones. Tea lights around pools. Smart scented jobs in glassware. Boutique Morocco runs on hot wax and scatter cushions, and these days you're more likely to find interior designers than kif dealers in the souks of Marrakesh.

It's been a long journey from difficult destination to frou-frou haven, but Morocco seems to have accomplished it, at least in part. In the era of "M6" as some call current King Mohammed VI the country has positioned itself as a prime soft-exotic destination, with Marrakesh the pink-encrusted jewel in its crown, surrounded by a plethora of safe-intrepid side options. Top line? A little light Orientalism, three hours from Heathrow.

I flew into the kingdom recently to see how things had progressed. First stop was Marrakesh, the rose city, and I began at the astonishing Amanjena, one of the toppest-end of Marrakesh flophouses. The central pool was the size of two football pitches; my "pavilion" room was the size of a flat in Kensington. It was like walking into an Orson Welles set. I was checked into the room by my "personal butler", Adil, who told me that Marrakesh kept breaking records. "We've had 6 million tourists this year in Marrakesh already," he said. "It's a record. And in 2010 we're expecting 10 million."

I wandered around the hassle-free Marrakesh medina the old art of shaking tourists down has been heartily stamped upon by M6 and eyed up lime-green babouche slippers and puce pouffes. The place was seething with bourgeois bohemians, all piled into Marrakech's riads, of which there are now an estimated 500. At Djemaa el-Fna, Marrakesh's mega-sight, our small group met two guides, Lydia Lecetre and Laetitia Trouillet, both French and both mistresses of the art of shopping. Laetitia led a female posse on a "personal shopping" trip, while I went sight-seeing with Lydia, who led me deep into the medina to Ferblantiers square, specialist in metalwork; the carpet section, the weaving section, and so on.

I raised my camera to take in these preposterously photogenic sights, and a few heads bobbed expectantly. Careful: Lydia warned that photography had inflated to 20dh (1.20) a snap, Never pay more than 10dh, she said, adding that "some think it is forbidden by the Koran". But wasn't the Koran written 13 centuries before photography? Never mind. Postcards were fine.

Marrakesh can only detain one for a while, and our second leg was due. I set off to the airport, to ride a small Cessna over the High Atlas mountains. The rosy pink of Marrakesh gave way to the khaki of the high ground then we touched down in tongue-twisting Ouarzazate, in a spanking new airport. Why here? Because Ouarzazate is home to "Mollywood": the desert film industry. The Atlas Studios has plugged the gap for desert locations: Gladiator, Babel, Black Hawk Down, The Kingdom all made here. Indeed, Leonardo DiCaprio was rumoured to be close by filming Ridley Scott's latest.

We skirted the prosperous town and went east. A few disconsolate camels straddled the roadside, and the odd pea-green grand taxi plied the road, otherwise it was rocky and remote: an almost Martian landscape of reddish rocks, hillocks and dry gullies. Several miles on, and ruined hulks began to emerge surrounded by date palms and djellaba-clad locals. This was the Dades Valley, aka the "Valley of a Thousand Kasbahs": the route once plied by caravans from Timbuktu. Now the great adobe piles are obsolete and rotted by rain, but some (mainly French) entrepreneurs were restoring them, re-chiselling the curiously Inca-like decorations, and bringing them on to the holiday market. How much was an old kasbah? "Best not to ask 'how much'," said Abdou, a guide for my destination, the Dar Ahlam. "Ask 'how many owners'." After centuries in the same family, getting clear title was tough.

The car turned off on to a mud road, through a palmeraie, across a wadi, and into the Dar Ahlam, precisely one of those refurbished kasbahs. Truly frou'd, the Dar had cushions coordinated to season red for winter, green for summer and candles a-plenty: in niches, on floors, in candelabras. Bossa Nova gently played as I checked in, then we set off once more along the valley, inshallah to return for tea.

The countryside became prettier, then came the town of El-Kelaa m'Gouna, the centre of Morocco's rose industry, with pretty shops selling rose water. Further on we climbed, stopping at a remote highland valley where the few locals eked out a living as troglodytic nomads.

Off piste we went in the four-wheel drive (many roads aren't sealed in rural Morocco) then Abdou led our small group on a walk along a river valley, where clear water trilled from the mountains, irrigating strip farms where wheat, barley, figs and the valley's signature pink roses grew honoured in the spring festival which brings the valley to life.

On return, I went to the hammam and took a gommage, the hard core scrub that precedes a massage. Normally handled by a beefy geezer, this gommage-ist was female, chic and followed by a nimble-fingered colleague, offering a choice between verbena, ylang ylang and argan; the latter from the spiky tree that grows only on Morocco's coast. Things could have been worse. Afterwards, I walked around the olive grove, nosed in the leather and candle shop, then wallowed in the pool. The view up to the Atlas over the papyrus was stupendous, the air soothing.

The next day Abdou led us to the Kasbah Amerdihl, pretty well Skoura's sole attraction. Inside this 17th-century edifice, figs and lemons grow around a fountain, while ghostly, uninhabited rooms hint at previous functions: men in one, women in another, cooking here, washing there. It shouldn't be long before it's filled with scented candles.

How to get there

A four-night trip to Morocco with cazenove+loyd (020-7384 2332; cazloyd.com) costs from 1,564 per person, based on two sharing. The price includes return flights with British Airways, private transfers, domestic transport, two nights' room-only in a Pavilion at Amanjena in Marrakesh and two nights all-inclusive in a Kasbah Suite at Dar Ahlam in Skoura.

Further reading 'Morocco That Was' by Walter Harris is published by Eland, 12.99

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