Algeria's desert glories dazzle, for a few

By Abdelaziz Boumzar

TIMIMOUN, Algeria (Reuters) - Saharan sand dunes stretch to the horizon at this oasis town of red clay where visitors can ride camels with Tuareg nomads and sleep on dunes under the stars.

Timimoun should be easy to get to, but it isn't. It offers few comforts after a long, arduous journey. But those few tourists who make it here value its remoteness.

"Only a few tourists are here compared to Morocco -- which is very good," said Marene Nordal from Norway, enjoying the isolation 1,200 km (750 miles) southwest of the capital Algiers.

Local people are less appreciative of their region's "undiscovered" cachet.

They want more hotels and better transport links, and say Timimoun's isolation reflects a wider failure to promote the cultural and scenic glories of Africa's second largest country.

"The more tourists we get the better because it will boost the local economy," said M'hamed Asmiti, 63, who runs a handicraft shop in Kali, 30 km (20 miles) from Timimoun.

"Tourism could reduce unemployment. One tourist feeds 12 people here per day," said tourism operator Mustafa Djebaili.

Algeria receives just 1.4 million visitors annually and most of them are Algerians back from France on holiday. Neighbors Tunisia and Morocco each welcome 6 million foreigners a year.

The lack of travelers is testimony to Algeria's long neglect of a sector that remains one of world tourism's undiscovered gems.

NEGLECT

Algeria offers magnificent Roman and Islamic sites -- and excellent beaches -- just an hour's flight from Europe yet villages like Timimoun lie undisturbed.

The town plays host to an annual festival to mark the birth of the Prophet Mohammed, when thousands of desert-dwellers draped in colorful robes converge on Timimoun and outlying villages for a week of feasting and revelry.

At this year's event in March, turbaned men shot ceremonial muskets and charged, on camels, in a blur of flapping robes across dunes bearing flags on ornate standards.

Just a handful of tourists saw the spectacle, a glimpse of a region of Algeria far removed from the Mediterranean north where al Qaeda-aligned groups stage sporadic suicide bombings.

"It is the most beautiful desert in the world," said Austrian Stephanie de Windish. "People are very warm and the music is simply great. There is no danger at all."