Yasuko293
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Trek inside the High Atlas Mountains of Morocco
What exactly is it love walking within the High Atlas mountains of Morocco? In June 2010 several us discovered once we did a 7 day trek from Imlil and among Toubkal-Trekking.com guides, whose name is Jamal. It was our first experience of a "guided trek" and we had no regrets by the end.
To start with, we meet up with they that is made up of the guide, a cook, and mules and muleteers. The mules perform the work of carrying the camping equipment, a lot of the food needed for the trek and our heavy luggage, preferably packed in the rucksack. Contrary to popular belief, they'll use only female mules as his or her temperament is best suited to the task. They start working with light loads around twelve months this will let you working life of 27 - 30 years. Good mules may cost around 950 and will carry as much as 140kg.
Accommodation on the trek varied from camping, refuges or residing in a Berber village house. The camp sites were often idyllic, usually from the side of the stream or river - perfect for summer swimming - and included a dining tent which provided defense against heat of the sun and in the night shelter from your cold and even occasional rain. In June, even as learned, it is still cold during the night once we camped above 2,000m.
We stayed a night within the Toubkal refuge which at 3207m is approximately 1000m beneath the summit of Toubkal (4167m) This is a large, modern refuge with dormitories of varying sizes, good showers plus a large communal area with roaring fire - essential when we arrived in a snow storm! Our food here had been prepared by our cook, though we're able to also buy snacks from the refuge shop. You can find stunning views in the refuge up on the Toubkal summit and down again the valley.
Recognized we stayed in the Berber village house in Amsouzerte Village. This village, like many around the trek, doesn't have electricity, so lighting and heating (for your showers) was by bottled gas. Again our food was prepared by our own cook - a tasty chicken tajine - the chicken being bought within the village. Incidentally, you can easily spot the villages with electricity as virtually every house has a large white satellite dish on the flat roof, clearly visible while you approach the village.
On another occasion, because of rainwater Jamal arranged for people to settle a pilgrims' hostel in the shrine of Sidi Chamarouch. This is an unusual experience since the shrine attracts many pilgrims who arrive by walking or mule and turn into the night time. The shrine is barred to non-Muslims, but fortunately the hostel is not! Because always we used the ground on comfortable sleeping mats that your mules carried. We simply needed to provide our own sleeping bags - and that we were glad we had brought warm ones. At altitude it is always cold during the night. Sidi Chamarouch, because of the pilgrims and trekkers who go through, is filled with small stalls and shops selling snacks, soft drinks and souvenirs. It absolutely was almost surreal following the barrenness of many of the trek.
trek high atlas
Our three mules carried our food which was supplemented with fresh food, particularly eggs, fresh bread and meat, bought within the villages on the way, though there aren't shops as we know them inside the High Atlas villages. All the food was cooked by Lahcen, our cook. Unlike Jamal who spoke excellent and colloquial English, the muleteers spoke no English and just Lahcen spoke some French.
Breakfast was a young meal and consisted of a fashionable drink (tea, coffee with dried milk), bread, jam, chocolate and cheese spreads and honey. It was enough to handle at 6.30 in the morning! We then set off for the morning's trek.
After our departure the muleteers packed everything up, loaded the mules and would overtake us about the trail and be ready to welcome us, around midday, with mint tea followed by a freshly prepared picnic lunch - filled with blankets to take a seat on! Lunch was a cold buffet, typically pasta, sardines (Morocco is a major world producer), tuna and salad, and in addition - Lahcen's speciality - a fashionable dish of potato, tomato and chick peas or even a Moroccan omelette.
Whenever we finished our day's walk, usually mid afternoon, i was always offered mint tea. After the trek our initial enthusiasm for mint tea had waned! Only then do we had the capacity to unwind, explore or talk, often with Jamal about the Berber life-style. The evening meal was usually soup plus a meat or vegetable tajine prepared from the basic ingredients (potatoes and carrots were peeled by the cooks) and cooked very efficiently over a small gas stove. Whenever feasible there was fresh fruit (melon, oranges). No alcohol though, if you don't sneak some together with you.
A lot of the walking we did was along narrow stony tracks, sometimes very faint and rarely waymarked. With no guide it might are already very easy to acquire lost - yet we might meet young kids herding goats in remote valleys or on high peaks, miles through the village. One time a new boy aged about 14 saw us from his village in the valley heading for a pass at 3,500m and had climbed up over 1000m to meet us at the very top. Whenever we arrived in a biting wind on the summit he had beaten us and hang up in a row the six bottles of Coke he'd carried up with him that she hoped we would buy. We did but more out of popularity of his toughness and entrepreneurial spirit than desire for a fizzy drink. He packed away the empties and hang off again along the valley in the Wellingtons.
As we approached the villages we had the small cultivated fields, with crops of potatoes, maize, tomatoes and oats and wheat. In the fertile valleys were orchards of cherry, walnut and apple. Young kids were herding goats or travelling to school, women were carrying heavy bundles of fodder cut from your fields for the cattle, men were tilling the fields. After we saw an enormous tipper lorry carrying about forty workers returning to their villages. Piece by piece the traditional Berber way of life is beginning to change as tracks are widened and be passable to trucks, holes are ready for electricity pylons plus more villages are linked to a mains supply.
But June remains the time of the transhumance for a lot of in high altitude, the going up of whole villages from your valleys for the high summer pastures. We had empty villages being gotten ready for summer occupation. They were encompassed by mountain pastures and extensive, old networks of irrigation ditches. One shepherd we met wondered where all others was: he had apparently trigger weekly roughly too soon and it was now being forced to return down the valley!
We carried only day packs and as we knew we might meet up with the mules again at lunchtime, we carried only essential items: water (purified stream water), snacks (brought with us from England) and further clothing as it can be snowy at altitude. Walking poles are extremely useful and good boots essential for certainly not per day trek from Imlil. The walking itself is not difficult and Jamal ensured that people maintained a leisurely pace, allowing the required time for stops, photo opportunities and scenery gazing. He also took pride and pleasure in explaining to us the Berber way of life. We many userful stuff here regarding language, culture, religion, agriculture, family life - and mules! We also discovered that the indigenous fauna of the area includes foxes, rabbits, wild goats and squirrel, but were assured that it is freezing for snakes and scorpions - at least once we were there!
Most of us suffered to some extent with altitude sickness through the initial few days. I was glad that by the time we reached the Toubkal refuge we had acclimatised, helped by daily climbs over passes of more than 3000m and also by camping at altitude. Within the refuge we met another party of walkers that had walked up from Imlil in a day, a height gain of approximately 1500m. They were not experienced or very fit and were struggling with sore feet and altitude sickness. They intended to climb Toubkal these morning, speculate we discovered, they were not fit or well enough together to descend.
