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S TA R K & W I L D
AFRICA
Only the Arctic and Antarctic rival the Saha-
ra desert among the Earth’s emptiest places.
Covering 3.6 million square miles (9.4 million
sq km)—just smaller than the United States—
it appears in the popular imagination as a
sea of sand, a landscape of endless, wind-
blown dunes stretching to sun-hazed hori-
zons. In truth, most of the Sahara consists of
hamada
—huge, barren, rocky plateaus—as
well as salt flats and vast dry valleys. Every
few years, it has snow on its highest point,
Emi Koussis (11,204 ft/3,415 m).
DON’T MISS
Go camel trekking in the immense Erg Chebbi Dunes
in Morocco, the safest and most accessible way to
experience the Sahara, and see the desert land-
scapes as they have been seen and traveled by many
of its inhabitants for thousands of years.
A camel train traverses the undulating and apparently
limitless dunes of the Sahara.
sahara
desert