Man-made lake near Volubilis

Water management is obviously pretty important to desert countries like Morocco, but the rivers didn't tend to be in great shape once they'd left the mountains. There is a slow build-up of infrastructure though; on our way from Volubilis to Fez we stopped for a break on a pass above this man-made (1996) dam, which is about 5km long – the dam itself and half the lake is out of sight around the corner at the far end of the shot.

A bit of digging indicates that it's the barrage Mikkés (Mikkas dam, though it should probably be Mikkés lake, as the dam is apparently called Sidi Chahed). There's a mosque visible in the right of the picture – that's the small village of Nzala el Oudaïa.

Squash hung on strings to keep it off the ground. We stretched our legs, bought some persimmon, and patted the donkey. We rolled on to Fez.