Majorie767
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Trek in the High Atlas Mountains of Morocco
The facts love walking in the High Atlas mountains of Morocco? In June 2010 a group of us found out once we did a 7 day trek from Imlil and among Toubkal-Trekking.com guides, whose name is Jamal. It had been our first connection with a "guided trek" and that we didn't have regrets at the end.
First of all, we meet up with the team which is made up of the guide, a cook, and mules and muleteers. The mules carry out the effort of carrying the camping equipment, the majority of the food required for the trek and our heavy luggage, preferably packed in the rucksack. Contrary to popular belief, they use only female mules as their temperament is much better suited to the task. They start dealing with light loads at approximately 12 months and also have a working duration of 27 - 3 decades. Good mules may cost around 950 and may carry as much as 140kg.
Accommodation on the trek varied from camping, refuges or staying in a Berber village house. The camp sites were often idyllic, usually from the side of your stream or river - well suited for summer swimming - and included a dining tent which provided protection from heat with the sun and in the night shelter from your cold and also occasional rain. In June, even as learned, it's still very cold during the night as we camped above 2,000m.
We stayed per night in the Toubkal refuge which at 3207m is about 1000m beneath the summit of Toubkal (4167m) This is a large, modern refuge with dormitories of varying sizes, good showers along with a large communal area with roaring fire - necessary whenever we arrived in a snow storm! Our food here was still being served by our cook, though we're able to also buy snacks from your refuge shop. You can find stunning views from the refuge up towards the Toubkal summit and back 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 the showers) was by bottled gas. Again our food was served by our personal cook - a tasty chicken tajine - the chicken being bought within the village. Incidentally, you can easily see the villages with electricity as nearly every house features a large white satellite dish about the flat roof, clearly visible as you approach the village.
On another occasion, because of bad weather Jamal arranged for us to settle a pilgrims' hostel in the shrine of Sidi Chamarouch. This was an unusual experience because the shrine attracts many pilgrims who arrive by walking or mule and stay the night time. The shrine itself is barred to non-Muslims, but fortunately the hostel isn't! Here as always we slept on the ground on comfortable sleeping mats that your mules carried. We simply required to provide our own sleeping bags - and that we were glad there were brought warm ones. At altitude it is usually cold through the night. Sidi Chamarouch, because of the pilgrims and trekkers who go through, is full of small stalls and shops selling snacks, soft drinks and souvenirs. It was almost surreal following the barrenness on most from the trek.
trek atlas mountains
Our three mules carried our food that was supplemented with fresh foods, particularly eggs, fresh bread and meat, bought within the villages along the way, even though there aren't shops as you may know them inside the High Atlas villages. Every one of the food was cooked by Lahcen, our cook. Unlike Jamal who spoke excellent and colloquial English, the muleteers spoke no English in support of Lahcen spoke some French.
Breakfast was an early meal and was comprised of a hot drink (tea, coffee with dried milk), bread, jam, chocolate and cheese spreads and honey. This was enough to face at 6.30 each day! Then we trigger for that morning's trek.
After our departure the muleteers packed everything up, loaded the mules and would overtake us around the trail and stay prepared to welcome us, around midday, with mint tea followed by a freshly prepared picnic lunch - detailed with blankets to sit down on! Lunch was a cold buffet, typically pasta, sardines (Morocco can be a major world producer), tuna and salad, and also - Lahcen's speciality - a hot dish of potato, tomato and chick peas or a Moroccan omelette.
Once we finished our day's walk, usually mid afternoon, we were always offered mint tea. After the trek our initial enthusiasm for mint tea had waned! We then had the capacity to wind down, explore or talk, often with Jamal about the Berber way of life. Supper was usually soup along with a meat or vegetable tajine prepared from your basic ingredients (potatoes and carrots were peeled from the cooks) and cooked very efficiently over a small gas stove. Whenever feasible there is berry (melon, oranges). No alcohol though, unless you sneak some with you.
A lot of the walking we did was along narrow stony tracks, sometimes very faint and rarely waymarked. With no guide it could have been quite simple to acquire lost - yet we'd meet young boys herding goats in remote valleys or on high peaks, miles from the village. One time a boy aged about 14 saw us from his village in the valley heading for a pass at 3,500m coupled with climbed up over 1000m to meet us towards the top. When we arrived at a biting wind on the summit he had beaten us and hang up up in a row the six bottles of Coke he'd carried on top of him that she hoped we might buy. We did but more out of admiration for his toughness and entrepreneurial spirit than desire to have a fizzy drink. He packed away the empties and hang up off again down the valley as part of his Wellingtons.
Once we approached the villages we saw the tiny cultivated fields, with crops of potatoes, maize, tomatoes and oats and wheat. Inside the fertile valleys were orchards of cherry, walnut and apple. Small children were herding goats or approaching school, women were carrying heavy bundles of fodder cut in the fields for the cattle, men were tilling the fields. If we saw an enormous tipper lorry carrying about forty workers to their villages. Piece by piece the standard Berber life-style is evolving as tracks are widened and become passable to trucks, holes have decided for electricity pylons and much more villages are attached to a mains supply.
But June is still the time of the transhumance for a lot of in high altitude, the moving up of whole villages from the valleys towards the high summer pastures. We saw empty villages being gotten ready for summer occupation. These folks were flanked by mountain pastures and extensive, old networks of irrigation ditches. One shepherd we met was wondering where everyone else was: he had apparently tripped per week or so too quickly and was now having to return on the valley!
We carried only day packs so that as we knew we'd 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 very cold at altitude. Walking poles are very useful and good boots required for anything but each day trek from Imlil. The walking is not difficult and Jamal made sure that people maintained a leisurely pace, allowing the required time for stops, photo opportunities and scenery gazing. Younger crowd took pride and pleasure in explaining to us the Berber life-style. We many userful stuff here regarding their language, culture, religion, agriculture, family life - and mules! Additionally we learned that the indigenous fauna of the area includes foxes, rabbits, wild goats and squirrel, but were assured that it's too cold for snakes and scorpions - at least once we were there!
Most of us suffered to some degree with altitude sickness through the first couple of days. We were glad that once we reached the Toubkal refuge there were acclimatised, helped by almost daily climbs over passes of more than 3000m by camping at altitude. In the refuge we met another party of walkers who had walked up from Imlil in a day, a height gain of approximately 1500m. They weren't experienced or very fit and were struggling with sore feet and altitude sickness. They intended to climb Toubkal the following morning, but as we discovered, they were not fit or sufficiently and had to descend.
