Q&A with Moon Author Lucas Peters
On the eve of the new edition of Moon Morocco, we chatted with author Lucas Peters about his experiences—and why Morocco belongs on your bucket list.
What sets Morocco apart?
Morocco refuses to be what you expect it to be. Come expecting chaos and you’ll find yourself sitting in a courtyard of impossible stillness; come expecting solitude and the medina will pull you into its current before you’ve found your bearings. It is Amazigh and Arab and African and Mediterranean, ancient and entirely alive, and it resists every tidy category travelers try to place it in. After nearly twenty years of living and guiding here, I’m convinced that’s not an accident — Morocco has simply always been too complex to be pinned down, and that’s precisely what keeps drawing people back. Or, if you’re like me, just keeping you here.
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What was your favorite experience while researching the latest edition?
Spending time in the Anti-Atlas and the Souss region for the 4th edition reminded me that Morocco still holds landscapes most travelers never see—dramatically eroded peaks in shades of ochre and violet, ancient fortified granaries (“agadir”) clinging to hillsides and hilltops, and argan forests that stretch to the horizon with nothing but the sound of wind and goats.
The market town of Tiznit, the hilltop villages above Taroudant, the road to Tafraoute winding through painted boulders—it’s a part of Morocco that feels genuinely off the radar even now. Researching it felt less like work and more like a reminder that after fifteen years here, this country is still showing me new rooms. On a hike through an oasis in the region cutting down from Tafraoute I paused as an old man was chatting an Amazight song and working in his garden. I stopped and asked him if I would record the song, which he did, and it’s a recording I come back to again and again just to feel that sense of out-there-ness this part of Morocco gives.
Your favorite hike?
I grew up hiking, and part of what keeps me in Morocco are the variety of hikes available, though Jbel Toubkal, North Africa’s highest peak, is the one that I keep coming back to. What stays with me isn’t the summit statistics—it’s the moment the Atlas Mountains open up around you and you realize the scale of what you’re standing in. The approach through the village of Armed, the refuge overnight, the final push to 4,167 meters in the pre-dawn dark—it’s a proper mountain experience that rewards every bit of effort you put in. I’ve done it more than once and the summit view never gets old and when I have time, hiking elsewhere on the less-trodden paths of the mountains has been incredible.
Favorite place to get a bite to eat or a cup of coffee?
For food, I’ll take a bowl of bissara—a silky fava bean soup drizzled with a healthy dose of olive oil, cumin, and chili ; served with a healthy half round of bread—at any hole-in-the-wall street stand over most sit-down meals in Morocco; it’s cheap, warming, and deeply local in a way that never gets old.
For coffee, as a Seattleite I take this seriously: in Tangier, Omeza is my go-to, a wonderfully unpretentious spot where retirees and university students share tables and nobody’s performing for Instagram. In Marrakesh I skip the famous Café Bacha lines and head instead to Mandala Society, which is quieter, less of a scene, and makes a better cup.
What hidden gem, unexpected experience, or underrated spot do you want to share with travelers?
Most travelers who make it to the Moroccan Sahara end up at Erg Chebbi near Merzouga—beautiful, but increasingly well-trodden. Erg Chigaga, reachable only by a rocky Hamada of a piste west of M’Hamid, requires more commitment to get to, and that friction is the point: the dune sea is larger, the nights darker, and the sense that you’ve actually earned the silence is something you can’t manufacture. Historically, this part of the Sahara connects via the Salt Road Trail across the distant Timbuktu and the overland route through the rest of Africa. Somehow, it all hits different and feels like a well-earned experience.
About Lucas Peters
Since 2009, Lucas has been traveling Morocco, from the date groves of the Sahara to the fishing villages along the Atlantic Coast. He lives full-time in Tangier with his wife and two kids. Together, as a multilingual family, they continue to explore Morocco: the small towns dotting the national roads, the difficult-to-access mountain villages, secluded beaches, and vibrant, twisting passages of the old medinas.
