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Trek inside the High Atlas Mountains of Morocco
What exactly is it love walking inside the High Atlas mountains of Morocco? In June 2010 a group of us learned whenever we did a 7 day trek from Imlil using one of Toubkal-Trekking.com guides, whose name is Jamal. It was our first connection with a "guided trek" and that we didn't have regrets at the end.
To start with, we encounter the team that's 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 needed for the trek and our heavy luggage, preferably packed in the rucksack. Surprisingly, they use only female mules his or her temperament is best fitted to the task. They begin working together with light loads at approximately 12 months and also have a working life of 27 - 30 years. Good mules could cost around 950 and can carry approximately 140kg.
Accommodation about the trek varied from camping, refuges or staying in a Berber village house. The camp ground sites were often idyllic, usually by the side of a stream or river - well suited for summer swimming - and included a dining tent which provided protection from the heat of the sun as well as in the evening shelter from your cold and even occasional rain. In June, once we learned, will still be cold during the night once we camped above 2,000m.
We stayed a night within the Toubkal refuge which at 3207m is approximately 1000m beneath the summit of Toubkal (4167m) It's a large, modern refuge with dormitories of varying sizes, good showers plus a large communal area with roaring fire - necessary when we found its way to a snow storm! Our food here was still being made by our cook, though we're able to also buy snacks from the refuge shop. You will find stunning views from the refuge up towards the Toubkal summit and back the valley.
Recognized we stayed in a Berber village house in Amsouzerte Village. This village, like many about the trek, doesn't have electricity, so lighting and heating (for the showers) was by bottled gas. Again our food was served by our very own cook - a tasty chicken tajine - the chicken being bought inside the village. Incidentally, it is easy to see the villages with electricity as just about any house includes a large white satellite dish about 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 was an odd experience since the shrine attracts many pilgrims who arrive when walking or mule and turn into the night. 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 needed to provide our personal sleeping-bags - so we were glad there were brought warm ones. At altitude it will always be cold at night. Sidi Chamarouch, due to the pilgrims and trekkers who go through, is full of small stalls and shops selling snacks, sodas and souvenirs. It was almost surreal following the barrenness on most from the trek.
high atlas mountains trek
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, though there aren't shops as we know them in the High Atlas villages. All 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 consisted of a warm drink (tea, coffee with dried milk), bread, jam, chocolate and cheese spreads and honey. This is enough to face at 6.30 each morning! Only then do we trigger for the morning's trek.
After our departure the muleteers packed everything up, loaded the mules and would overtake us on the trail and stay able to welcome us, around midday, with mint tea then a freshly prepared picnic lunch - detailed with blankets to sit down on! Lunch was a cold buffet, typically pasta, sardines (Morocco is really a major world producer), tuna and salad, as well as - Lahcen's speciality - a hot 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! We then had the capacity to unwind, explore or talk, often with Jamal in regards to the Berber way of life. Supper was usually soup and a meat or vegetable tajine prepared from your basic ingredients (potatoes and carrots were peeled from the cooks) and cooked very efficiently on a small gas stove. Whenever you can there is fresh fruit (melon, oranges). No alcohol though, unless you sneak some along with you.
A lot of the walking we did was along narrow stony tracks, sometimes very faint and infrequently waymarked. With no guide it would have been super easy to acquire lost - yet we might meet young kids herding goats in remote valleys or on high peaks, miles through the village. On one occasion a boy aged about 14 had seen us from his village within the valley heading for a pass at 3,500m together climbed up over 1000m to fulfill us at the top. Whenever we arrived in a biting wind at the summit he previously beaten us and hang in a row the six bottles of Coke he'd carried up with him that they hoped we would buy. We did but higher productivity of admiration for his toughness and entrepreneurial spirit than desire to have a fizzy drink. He packed away the empties and hang off again along the valley in his Wellingtons.
Once we approached the villages we saw 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 in the fields for the cattle, men were tilling the fields. After we saw a massive tipper lorry carrying about forty workers back to their villages. Bit by bit the original Berber way of life is evolving as tracks are widened and be passable to trucks, holes are ready for electricity pylons and more villages are attached to a mains supply.
But June remains to be the duration of the transhumance for many in high altitude, the going up of whole villages in the valleys to the high summer pastures. We got empty villages being ready for summer occupation. They were encompassed by mountain pastures and extensive, old networks of irrigation ditches. One shepherd we met wondered where everybody else was: he previously apparently set off a week roughly too early and was now being forced to return down the valley!
We carried only day packs so when we knew we might catch up with the mules again at lunchtime, we carried only essential items: water (purified stream water), snacks (brought around from England) and additional clothing as possible very cold at altitude. Walking poles are very useful and good boots needed for anything but per day trek from Imlil. The walking itself is not so difficult and Jamal made certain 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 life-style. We learned a lot regarding their language, culture, religion, agriculture, family life - and mules! Additionally we discovered that the indigenous fauna with the area includes foxes, rabbits, wild goats and squirrel, but were assured it is freezing for snakes and scorpions - at least once we are there!
The majority of us suffered to varying degrees with altitude sickness throughout the first couple of days. We had been glad that by the time we reached the Toubkal refuge we'd acclimatised, helped by almost daily climbs over passes greater than 3000m and by camping at altitude. In the refuge we met another party of walkers who had walked up from Imlil in a single day, a height gain around 1500m. They were not experienced or very fit and were battling with sore feet and altitude sickness. They intended to climb Toubkal the next morning, but as we discovered, they were not fit or well enough and had to descend.
