Er Raoui

Between Tabelbala and the Gourara oases, the western Sahara stretches across dry plains and sand. Tabelbala is an isolated oasis where date gardens are watered by underground foggaras; eastward, the oasis settlements of the Gourara line the edge of the Grand Erg Occidental. These cultivated places form small islands amid a much larger desert, where stretches of open ground and dunes separate the palm groves.