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Trek in the High Atlas Mountains of Morocco
The facts enjoy walking within the High Atlas mountains of Morocco? In June 2010 a small grouping of us learned whenever we did a 7 day trek from Imlil with one of Toubkal-Trekking.com guides, whose name is Jamal. It was our first connection with a "guided trek" so we didn't have regrets at the end.
To start with, we connect with they that's consists of the guide, a cook, and mules and muleteers. The mules carry out the work of carrying the camping equipment, a lot of the food needed for the trek and our heavy luggage, preferably packed inside a rucksack. Believe it or not, they'll use only female mules his or her temperament is much better suitable for the work. They begin working together with light loads at approximately twelve months this will let you working lifetime of 27 - Thirty years. Good mules may cost around 950 and may carry approximately 140kg.
Accommodation around the trek varied from camping, refuges or residing in a Berber village house. The camp ground sites were often idyllic, usually through the side of your stream or river - perfect for summer swimming - and included a dining tent which provided protection from heat from the sun and also in the night shelter in the cold as well as occasional rain. In June, even as learned, will still be cold at night once we camped above 2,000m.
We stayed an evening inside the Toubkal refuge which at 3207m is about 1000m below the summit of Toubkal (4167m) It is a large, modern refuge with dormitories of varying sizes, good showers plus a large communal area with roaring fire - necessary once we arrived in a snow storm! Our food here was still made by our cook, though we could also buy snacks from the refuge shop. There are stunning views from the refuge up towards the Toubkal summit and back down the valley.
Recognized we stayed inside a Berber village house in Amsouzerte Village. This village, like many around the trek, doesn't have electricity, so lighting and heating (for that showers) was by bottled gas. Again our food was made 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 includes a large white satellite dish around the flat roof, clearly visible when you approach the village.
On another occasion, because of rainwater Jamal arranged for all of us to settle in a pilgrims' hostel on the shrine of Sidi Chamarouch. This is a strange experience since the shrine attracts many pilgrims who arrive when walking or mule and stay the evening. The shrine is barred to non-Muslims, but fortunately the hostel is not! Because always we slept on the floor on comfortable sleeping mats that your mules carried. We only needed to provide our personal sleeping-bags - and we were glad there were brought warm ones. At altitude it will always be cold through the night. Sidi Chamarouch, because of the pilgrims and trekkers who move through, is stuffed with small stalls and shops selling snacks, carbonated drinks and souvenirs. It was almost surreal following your barrenness on most with the trek.
trek in atlas mountains
Our three mules carried our food that has been supplemented with fresh foods, particularly eggs, fresh bread and meat, bought in the villages in route, 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 only Lahcen spoke some French.
Breakfast was an earlier meal and was comprised of a warm drink (tea, coffee with dried milk), bread, jam, chocolate and cheese spreads and honey. This was enough to handle at 6.30 each day! Then we 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 stay ready to welcome us, around midday, with mint tea then a freshly prepared picnic lunch - filled with blankets to sit on! Lunch would be a cold buffet, typically pasta, sardines (Morocco can be a major world producer), tuna and salad, and also - Lahcen's speciality - a fashionable dish of potato, tomato and chick peas or perhaps a Moroccan omelette.
When 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 concerning the Berber life style. Supper was usually soup plus a meat or vegetable tajine prepared in the basic ingredients (potatoes and carrots were peeled from the cooks) and cooked very efficiently on the small gas stove. Whenever you can there is fresh fruit (melon, oranges). No alcohol though, if you don't sneak some together with you.
Most of the walking we did was along narrow stony tracks, sometimes very faint and rarely waymarked. With no guide it could happen to be very easy to obtain lost - yet we would meet young kids herding goats in remote valleys or on high peaks, miles from any village. One time a new boy aged about 14 saw us from his village inside the valley heading for a pass at 3,500m together climbed up over 1000m to fulfill us at the top. When we arrived at a biting wind in the summit he had beaten us and set in a row the six bottles of Coke he'd carried up with him which he hoped we might buy. We did but higher productivity of admiration for his toughness and entrepreneurial spirit than wish to have a fizzy drink. He packed away the empties and set off again down the valley in his Wellingtons.
As we approached the villages we got the tiny cultivated fields, with crops of potatoes, maize, tomatoes and oats and wheat. Within 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 that cattle, men were tilling the fields. If we saw an enormous tipper lorry carrying about forty workers returning to their villages. Little by little the traditional Berber life style is beginning to change as tracks are widened and be passable to trucks, holes are ready for electricity pylons and much more villages are attached to a mains supply.
But June remains the time of the transhumance for most out in the wild, the going up of whole villages from the valleys to the high summer pastures. We got empty villages being ready for summer occupation. These were encompassed by mountain pastures and extensive, old networks of irrigation ditches. One shepherd we met was wondering where all others was: he previously apparently trigger weekly approximately too soon and was now being forced to return on the valley!
We carried only day packs so when we knew we would meet up with 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 possible very cold at altitude. Walking poles are extremely useful and good boots essential for certainly not per day trek from Imlil. The walking is not difficult and Jamal ensured that individuals maintained a leisurely pace, allowing plenty of time for stops, photo opportunities and scenery gazing. Younger crowd 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 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 whenever we are there!
Most of us suffered to some extent with altitude sickness during the first couple of days. We were glad that once we reached the Toubkal refuge we had acclimatised, helped by just about every day climbs over passes greater than 3000m and also by camping at altitude. Within the refuge we met another party of walkers who had walked up from Imlil in a single day, a height gain of approximately 1500m. They weren't experienced or very fit and were battling with sore feet and altitude sickness. They designed to climb Toubkal these morning, but as we discovered, they weren't fit or sufficiently coupled with to descend.
