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Trek in the High Atlas Mountains of Morocco
What is it really like walking in the High Atlas mountains of Morocco? In June 2010 a group of 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 connection with a "guided trek" and we didn't have regrets by the end.
First of all, we meet up with the c's that is consists of the guide, a cook, and mules and muleteers. The mules perform the hard work of carrying the camping equipment, the majority of the food required for the trek and our heavy luggage, preferably packed in a rucksack. Believe it or not, they will use only female mules his or her temperament is much better fitted to the work. They start working with light loads around twelve months and have a working duration of 27 - Thirty years. Good mules can cost around 950 and will carry approximately 140kg.
Accommodation around the trek varied from camping, refuges or staying in a Berber village house. The camp ground sites were often idyllic, usually from the side of your stream or river - perfect for summer swimming - and included a dining tent which provided protection from the heat with the sun and in the night shelter in the cold as well as occasional rain. In June, as we learned, it is still cold through the night as we camped above 2,000m.
We stayed a night within the Toubkal refuge which at 3207m is all about 1000m below 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 - essential whenever we arrived in a snow storm! Our food here had been made by our cook, though we could also buy snacks in the refuge shop. You can find stunning views in the refuge up towards the Toubkal summit and back the valley.
One night we stayed in a Berber village house in Amsouzerte Village. This village, like many about the trek, has no electricity, so lighting and heating (for the showers) was by bottled gas. Again our food was prepared by our very own cook - a tasty chicken tajine - the chicken being bought inside the village. Incidentally, you can easily see the villages with electricity as just about any house includes a large white satellite dish about 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 at the shrine of Sidi Chamarouch. This was an unusual experience as the shrine attracts many pilgrims who arrive on foot or mule and turn into the night. The shrine is barred to non-Muslims, but fortunately the hostel isn't! Because always we used the floor on comfortable sleeping mats which the mules carried. We only required to provide our own sleeping bags - so we were glad there were brought warm ones. At altitude it will always be cold through the night. Sidi Chamarouch, due to the pilgrims and trekkers who pass through, is filled with small stalls and shops selling snacks, sodas and souvenirs. It absolutely was almost surreal after the barrenness of many of the trek.
trek high atlas
Our three mules carried our food that has been supplemented with fresh foods, particularly eggs, fresh bread and meat, bought within the villages in route, 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 and only Lahcen spoke some French.
Breakfast was an early meal and consisted of a warm drink (tea, coffee with dried milk), bread, jam, chocolate and cheese spreads and honey. This is enough to handle at 6.30 in the morning! Then we trigger 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 followed by a freshly prepared picnic lunch - detailed with blankets to sit on! Lunch would be 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 a Moroccan omelette.
Whenever 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! Only then do we had the capacity to wind down, explore or talk, often with Jamal concerning the Berber life-style. Supper was usually soup plus a meat or vegetable tajine prepared from your basic ingredients (potatoes and carrots were peeled through the cooks) and cooked very efficiently on the small gas stove. Whenever feasible there was clearly fruit (melon, oranges). No alcohol though, until you sneak some with you.
The majority of the walking we did was along narrow stony tracks, sometimes very faint and rarely waymarked. With no guide it could are already super easy to acquire lost - yet we might meet young children 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 within the valley at risk of a pass at 3,500m together climbed up over 1000m to satisfy us towards the top. Whenever we arrived at a biting wind in the summit he had beaten us and hang up in a row the six bottles of Coke he previously carried track of him which he hoped we'd buy. We did but higher productivity of admiration for his toughness and entrepreneurial spirit than desire for a fizzy drink. He packed away the empties and hang up off again on the valley in his Wellingtons.
Once we approached the villages we got the little cultivated fields, with crops of potatoes, maize, tomatoes and oats and wheat. Inside the fertile valleys were orchards of cherry, walnut and apple. Young kids were herding goats or walking to school, women were carrying heavy bundles of fodder cut from your fields for your cattle, men were tilling the fields. Once we saw a huge tipper lorry carrying about forty workers back to their villages. Little by little the traditional Berber way of life is evolving as tracks are widened and turn into passable to trucks, holes are ready for electricity pylons plus more villages are attached to a mains supply.
But June is still the period of the transhumance for many in the mountains, the upgrading of whole villages from your valleys to the high summer pastures. We had empty villages being prepared for summer occupation. They were surrounded by mountain pastures and extensive, old networks of irrigation ditches. One shepherd we met wondered where everybody else was: he had apparently set off weekly or so too soon and was now needing to return down the valley!
We carried only day packs and as we knew we'd 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 they can be very cold at altitude. Walking poles are incredibly useful and good boots essential for certainly not per day trek from Imlil. The walking is not so difficult and Jamal ensured that people maintained a leisurely pace, allowing plenty of time for stops, photo opportunities and scenery gazing. Also, he took pride and pleasure in trying to explain to us the Berber way of life. We learned a lot regarding language, culture, religion, agriculture, family life - and mules! We discovered that the indigenous fauna with the area includes foxes, rabbits, wild goats and squirrel, but were assured that it's freezing for snakes and scorpions - no less than when we were there!
Most of us suffered to some extent with altitude sickness during the first few days. We had been glad that by the time we reached the Toubkal refuge we had acclimatised, helped by almost daily climbs over passes of more than 3000m and also by camping at altitude. In the refuge we met another party of walkers that had walked up from Imlil in a single day, a height gain of about 1500m. They were not experienced or very fit and were struggling with sore feet and altitude sickness. They designed to climb Toubkal the next morning, speculate we discovered, they weren't fit or sufficiently coupled with to descend.
