Lawana181
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Trek inside the High Atlas Mountains of Morocco
The facts love walking inside the High Atlas mountains of Morocco? In June 2010 several us learned once we did a 7 day trek from Imlil using one of Toubkal-Trekking.com guides, whose name is Jamal. It had been our first experience of a "guided trek" so we didn't have regrets by the end.
To begin with, we encounter they that is composed of the guide, a cook, and mules and muleteers. The mules do the hard work of carrying the camping equipment, the majority of the food necessary for the trek and our heavy luggage, preferably packed inside a rucksack. Surprisingly, they will use only female mules his or her temperament is best fitted to the task. They start working with light loads around 12 months this will let you working duration of 27 - Thirty years. Good mules may cost around 950 and can carry up to 140kg.
Accommodation about 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 - well suited for summer swimming - and included a dining tent which provided protection from heat from the sun as well as in the evening shelter in the cold and also occasional rain. In June, as we learned, it's still very cold through the night as we camped above 2,000m.
We stayed an evening within the Toubkal refuge which at 3207m is approximately 1000m below the summit of Toubkal (4167m) This is a large, modern refuge with dormitories of varying sizes, good showers and a large communal area with roaring fire - necessary when we arrived at a snow storm! Our food here was still being served by our cook, though we're able to also buy snacks in the refuge shop. You can find stunning views from the refuge up towards the Toubkal summit and back down the valley.
One night we stayed inside a Berber village house in Amsouzerte Village. This village, like many about the trek, does not have any 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 in the village. Incidentally, it is easy to see the villages with electricity as virtually every house has a large white satellite dish around the flat roof, clearly visible as you approach the village.
On another occasion, as a result of bad weather Jamal arranged for people to sleep in a pilgrims' hostel on the shrine of Sidi Chamarouch. This was an odd experience as the shrine attracts many pilgrims who arrive when walking or mule and remain the night time. The shrine is barred to non-Muslims, but fortunately the hostel just isn't! Because always we used the floor on comfortable sleeping mats that the mules carried. We simply necessary to provide our personal sleeping-bags - so we were glad there were brought warm ones. At altitude it is always cold through the night. Sidi Chamarouch, due to the pilgrims and trekkers who go through, is stuffed with small stalls and shops selling snacks, sodas and souvenirs. It had been almost surreal after the barrenness of many of the trek.
trek high atlas
Our three mules carried our food that was supplemented with fresh produce, particularly eggs, fresh bread and meat, bought within the villages on the way, even though there aren't shops as we know them in the High Atlas villages. All of 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 an earlier meal and was comprised of a hot drink (tea, coffee with dried milk), bread, jam, chocolate and cheese spreads and honey. It was enough to manage at 6.30 in the morning! We then tripped for the morning's trek.
After our departure the muleteers packed everything up, loaded the mules and would overtake us about the trail and become ready to welcome us, around midday, with mint tea followed by a freshly prepared picnic lunch - filled with blankets to sit on! Lunch would be a cold buffet, typically pasta, sardines (Morocco is really a major world producer), tuna and salad, and also - Lahcen's speciality - a warm dish of potato, tomato and chick peas or perhaps a Moroccan omelette.
When we finished our day's walk, usually mid afternoon, we had been always offered mint tea. After the trek our initial enthusiasm for mint tea had waned! We then had the capacity to unwind, explore or talk, often with Jamal concerning the Berber life style. The evening meal was usually soup and a meat or vegetable tajine prepared in the basic ingredients (potatoes and carrots were peeled through the cooks) and cooked very efficiently on a small gas stove. Whenever possible there was clearly berry (melon, oranges). No alcohol though, unless you sneak some with you.
The majority of the walking we did was along narrow stony tracks, sometimes very faint and barely waymarked. Without a guide it would happen to be very easy to get lost - yet we'd meet young boys herding goats in remote valleys or on high peaks, miles from the village. On one occasion a new boy aged about 14 had seen us from his village in the valley at risk of a pass at 3,500m together climbed up over 1000m to satisfy us at the very top. When we arrived in a biting wind on the summit he previously beaten us and hang up up in a row the six bottles of Coke he'd carried up with him which he hoped we would buy. We did but more out of popularity of his toughness and entrepreneurial spirit than desire to have a fizzy drink. He packed away the empties and hang off again on the valley in the Wellingtons.
Once we approached the villages we got the small cultivated fields, with crops of potatoes, maize, tomatoes and oats and wheat. Inside the fertile valleys were orchards of cherry, walnut and apple. Young children were herding goats or travelling to school, women were carrying heavy bundles of fodder cut from the fields for the cattle, men were tilling the fields. Once we saw a massive tipper lorry carrying about forty workers to their villages. Piece by piece the original Berber life-style is beginning to change as tracks are widened and become passable to trucks, holes have decided for electricity pylons and more villages are attached to a mains supply.
But June is still the time of the transhumance for a lot of out in the wild, the going up of whole villages in the valleys towards the high summer pastures. We saw empty villages being gotten ready for summer occupation. These were encompassed by mountain pastures and extensive, old networks of irrigation ditches. One shepherd we met wanted to ask where all others was: he'd apparently tripped per week approximately too early and was now needing to return on the valley!
We carried only day packs so when we knew we might get closer the mules again at lunchtime, we carried only essential items: water (purified stream water), snacks (brought along with us from England) and further clothing as it can be cold at altitude. Walking poles are incredibly useful and good boots essential for certainly not per day trek from Imlil. The walking itself is simple enough and Jamal made sure that we maintained a leisurely pace, allowing plenty of 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 their language, culture, religion, agriculture, family life - and mules! We also found that the indigenous fauna from the area includes foxes, rabbits, wild goats and squirrel, but were assured that it is too cold for snakes and scorpions - no less than once we are there!
Most of us suffered to some extent with altitude sickness throughout 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 one day, a height gain around 1500m. They weren't experienced or very fit and were struggling with sore feet and altitude sickness. They meant to climb Toubkal the next morning, but as we discovered, they weren't fit or good enough coupled with to descend.
