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Trek within the High Atlas Mountains of Morocco
What exactly is it love walking within the High Atlas mountains of Morocco? In June 2010 a group of us discovered once we did a 7 day trek from Imlil with one of Toubkal-Trekking.com guides, whose name is Jamal. It absolutely was our first connection with a "guided trek" so we had no regrets by the end.
First of all, we encounter the c's that's composed of the guide, a cook, and mules and muleteers. The mules carry out the work of carrying the camping equipment, the majority of the food required for the trek and our heavy luggage, preferably packed in a rucksack. Contrary to popular belief, they'll use only female mules as their temperament is better fitted to the task. They begin working together with light loads at about twelve months this will let you working duration of 27 - Thirty years. Good mules could cost around 950 and can carry approximately 140kg.
Accommodation around the trek varied from camping, refuges or remaining in a Berber village house. The camp ground sites were often idyllic, usually by the side of the stream or river - perfect for summer swimming - and included a dining tent which provided protection from heat with the sun as well as in the night shelter from your cold and even occasional rain. In June, once we learned, it's still cold at night once we camped above 2,000m.
We stayed per night inside the Toubkal refuge which at 3207m is approximately 1000m below the summit of Toubkal (4167m) It is a large, modern refuge with dormitories of varying sizes, good showers and a large communal area with roaring fire - essential when we found its way to a snow storm! Our food here had been served by our cook, though we could also buy snacks in the refuge shop. You can find stunning views in the refuge up for the Toubkal summit and down again the valley.
One evening we stayed in a Berber village house in Amsouzerte Village. This village, like many around 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, it is possible to spot the villages with electricity as just about any house includes a large white satellite dish around the flat roof, clearly visible as you approach the village.
On another occasion, due to weather Jamal arranged for all of us to sleep in a pilgrims' hostel in the shrine of Sidi Chamarouch. This is a strange experience because the shrine attracts many pilgrims who arrive on foot or mule and stay the night. The shrine itself is barred to non-Muslims, but fortunately the hostel isn't! Because always we used the floor on comfortable sleeping mats that your mules carried. We simply necessary to provide our personal sleeping-bags - so 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 pass through, is filled with small stalls and shops selling snacks, soft drinks and souvenirs. It was almost surreal following your barrenness on most with the trek.
atlas mountains trekking
Our three mules carried our food that was supplemented with fresh food, particularly eggs, fresh bread and meat, bought inside the villages along the way, though there aren't shops as we know them in 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 earlier meal and contained a hot drink (tea, coffee with dried milk), bread, jam, chocolate and cheese spreads and honey. This is enough to handle at 6.30 each day! We then set off for your morning's trek.
After our departure the muleteers packed everything up, loaded the mules and would overtake us around the trail and be able to welcome us, around midday, with mint tea then a freshly prepared picnic lunch - detailed with blankets to sit on! Lunch would be a cold buffet, typically pasta, sardines (Morocco can be a major world producer), tuna and salad, as well as - Lahcen's speciality - a hot dish of potato, tomato and chick peas or a Moroccan omelette.
Whenever we finished our day's walk, usually mid afternoon, we had been always offered mint tea. By the end of the trek our initial enthusiasm for mint tea had waned! Only then do we had time to relax, 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 on the small gas stove. Whenever feasible there was fresh fruit (melon, oranges). No alcohol though, until you sneak some with you.
A lot of the walking we did was along narrow stony tracks, sometimes very faint and barely waymarked. With out a guide it might happen to be super easy to get lost - yet we'd meet young children herding goats in remote valleys or on high peaks, miles from any village. On one occasion a boy aged about 14 saw us from his village inside the valley at risk of a pass at 3,500m together climbed up over 1000m to satisfy us at the very top. When we found its way to a biting wind in the summit he previously beaten us and hang in a row the six bottles of Coke he'd carried track of him that she hoped we'd 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 set off again along the valley in the Wellingtons.
Even as 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 walking to school, women were carrying heavy bundles of fodder cut from your fields for the cattle, men were tilling the fields. If we saw a huge tipper lorry carrying about forty workers returning to their villages. Bit by bit the original Berber way of life is beginning to change as tracks are widened and turn into passable to trucks, holes are prepared for electricity pylons plus more villages are attached to a mains supply.
But June is still the period of the transhumance for most out in the wild, the going up of whole villages from your valleys to the high summer pastures. We had empty villages being gotten ready for summer occupation. They were surrounded by mountain pastures and extensive, old networks of irrigation ditches. One shepherd we met wanted to ask where everyone else was: he previously apparently set off weekly or so too early and it was now needing to return down the valley!
We carried only day packs so that 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 extra clothing as possible cold at altitude. Walking poles are incredibly useful and good boots required for not a day trek from Imlil. The walking is not difficult and Jamal ensured 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 way of life. We many userful stuff here regarding their language, culture, religion, agriculture, family life - and mules! We also discovered that the indigenous fauna with the area includes foxes, rabbits, wild goats and squirrel, but were assured that it is freezing for snakes and scorpions - a minimum of once we were there!
The majority of us suffered to some degree with altitude sickness throughout the first few days. We had been glad that once we reached the Toubkal refuge we'd acclimatised, helped by almost 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 about 1500m. They weren't experienced or very fit and were battling with sore feet and altitude sickness. They intended to climb Toubkal the following morning, but as we discovered, they were not fit or sufficiently coupled with to descend.
