This story reminded me of a documentation I saw some years ago, about also a french guy in the sahara dessert. But more extreme, he was basically living in the dessert and moving around with his camels nomad style. Would be curious if he is still there. Possible.

Deserts are a special place. I can agree to the statement from the article. It is never boring. At least not, when you choose to do the real dessert experience. Then you discover joys you did not imagine before, like finding fresh, drinking water, when you are dehydrated since a while, because the last 2 water springs had dried out and you really had to find water. It can be orgastic, when your body literaly starts to be flowing again, as the body shuts down function after function if there is water shortage. And then it is a rush, if finally the blood can flow again ... (and that can actually kill you, if you drink too much too quick, after being dehydrated, start with some sips)

I experienced that not in a dessert, but on a long hike in a dry area, where fresh-water spots on my map did not had running water in reality and no civilisation around. So I was rationing water. But then the next day, I found a spring. And so much water coming out! I could not believe it, all this fresh water just flowing and flowing and flowing ...

Getting the "real desert experience" in terms of migrating with camels or whatever must be hard in recent years.

In Moroccan-occupied Western Sahara there is a heavy police presence that doesn't want foreigners straying off the main highways, because foreigners might make contact with representatives of the oppressed indigenous Saharawi people. Sure, hundreds or thousands of elderly Europeans go down there every winter in their camping cars, Senegalese immigrants in Europe driving home to visit etc., but all they see is the tarmac running alongside the coast or the occasional towns.

In Mauritania, police tend to discourage you from wandering for different reasons, they don’t want their tourism industry to suffer again from incidents of foreign tourists being attacked by militants. For similar reasons, southern Algeria is said to be difficult to move around in freely, and Libya is completely off-limits to tourists due to unrest.

Do you have any references?

Morocco is hugely popular with French / European 4x4 drivers and motorcyclists because of the terrain. It has everything, green mountains in the high atlas then sand, desert and mars like terrain as you go south and it's extremely quick and easy to get to jumping on a ferry from Spain.

I know they have army checkpoints at specific places but when I've been I've been extremely remote, way off the highway surrounded by nothing but sand dunes or baron landscapes. We drove through a checkpoint at one point which was essentially a small shed at the side of a track close to the Algerian border. Guard mustn't of heard us coming asleep in the office or something, came out waving after a few of us past, went back inside when we disappeared in to the distance.

Most people exploring Morocco overland are in Morocco proper, where there isn't the same strict control of foreigners as in Western Sahara. The checkpoints start at Guelmim and are spaced about every 100 km apart. One has to present one's ID or a printed page known as a fiche with these details (a web search for Western Sahara + fiche will probably give plenty of travel blogs with details on the police scrutiny). Plainclothes police are also present at the major intersections to report on what direction a foreign-owned vehicle takes.

Although Morocco proper has some sand dunes in the east which are popular with tourists, these are not the "real Sahara", which is traditionally considered to start at Guelmim.

Yeah, there is a great difference between morocco and occupied western sahara. My morocco experience started in western sahara - and it was interesting to watch, but no fun, to be bothered by secret police all the time. I had intentions of traveling around there and meeting local population and getting into the sahara, but this was not really possible in a way I wanted. I played the naive tourist quite well, so I was not too much pestered, as being a european tourist, because the king himself has ordered to all police to be nice to tourists. But they really do not want journalist, I had to convince many slimy assholes where I felt dirty to shake hands with them, that I was not a journalist, nver were and no intentions of becoming one. And since I really was not a journalist I decided to be it not worth it. But I have friends who drove around with a bycicle there and camping overnight, so that is possible, but not peaceful. And dangerous if you come too close to the border.

Morocco then again was really different, full of hippies and other tourists. It surely has dangerous spots as well, but I felt quite safe hitchhiking there and I even met young women, who did hitchhiking there, without being kidnapped or raped, but that can happen.

And the real dessert experience, well, I was south-east of Zagora, wich was quite touristic - but to me it seemed the "real Sahara" did also start there. I met local beduins who felt that way too, but yeah. The border to algeria was too close and too guarded. And in the real dessert there are no nation borders, who pester the nomad.

If you find the Sahara interesting, check out an older documentary by Pailin for the BBC.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=O0A3JyK_N34

Note that these were done in 2001

Wish I was brave enough to explore some of these places. Unfortunately I feel I would almost certainly be killed, if not by man, then by the elements.