Just as Marrakesh was a study in contrasts, our experience in the Atlas mountains couldn’t have been more starkly different than our time in the city. We really had no idea what to expect with our three day trek. I booked the trip through a UK tour company and hadn’t really thought too much more about the details. My primary concern before we left Sevilla was whether or not we had the appropriate clothing. I was a little stunned when the tour company emailed me a packing list that suggested that we needed hiking boots, gaiters, and gortex...needless to say, we had none of these things, and I wasn’t sure that we wanted to embark on an adventure in Morocco that actually required that gear. I spent some time looking at long term weather forecasts which were both reassuring and troubling. The week before we were scheduled to trek, the high in Imlil, our starting point, was 39 degrees, which is pretty cold if you are planning to hike up 2000 feet from that starting point. On the plus side, the forecast for the week we were to hike offered a high of 65 degrees, which sounded better. I did buy running tights for everyone, thinking that we would use them at home, and they could serve as long underwear if need be. Otherwise, I figured that we would cross our fingers that the weather report would hold.
A car picked us up at our hotel in Marrakesh and took us directly to the mountain town of Imlil, which ends up being the starting point for most all of the trekking in the Atlas mountains - it is the only valley in the area that benefits from tourism. The weather looked like it would be good for at least the first two days of our trek, so I wasn’t concerned until I saw a series of shops in the town offering crampons for walking in snow...perhaps I should have studied French so I could communicate a little better. We were dropped at a small shop where Hussain, our guide, met us and offered us tea. Turns out it is not really appropriate to do anything in Morocco without offering tea first. We didn’t really want tea, but it seemed only appropriate to accept it when offered. However, Hussain was basically waiting for us to drink our tea, creating.a funny little scene - he is anxious to get going because we have a long day ahead and are getting a late start, and we are drinking tea that we don’t really want because we don’t want to offend him. We suggested that we were ready, and he and the muleteer packed up our mule - the mule being a most impressive little beast. And we headed out. I asked about crampons, etc., and Hussain, who spoke pretty good English, said it was no problem. Imlil serves as a starting point for summiting Toubkal, the highest peak in the Atlas and the second highest peak in Africa, which explains the gear available in the town. It had been snowing in the town the week before, but the sun was out and the sky was brilliantly blue.
We headed out walking up through the town which is built up the face of a hill, and we proceeded to climb about 2000 feet over the course of the next two and a half hours. It was a pretty impressive climb, both for the incline and for the vistas. We walked with a stunning view of the Toubkal and the Atlas peaks, but the trail was vertical enough that we were mostly hiking head down. While this day ended up being Beth and my favorite of our entire time in Morocco, Maya was pretty annoyed with the length of the day’s hike; she had no trouble with the elevation or the milage, but she would rather run and jump than walk. We hiked to a saddle pass at about 8000 feet where Houssain laid out a carpet and some pads for lunch. The Muleteer/cook prepared a huge salad and a tagine of lentils which we ate under a glorious blue sky looking up at the snow capped peaks of the Atlas mountains. I can’t really imagine a more spectacular place for lunch...despite the lack of a icy cold small beer, to say nothing of how nice it is to be served a warm lunch on a hike. After lunch we hiked for a couple more hours before we were offered the option to hike up a valley to a large waterfall. For me, there was no question that you extend the hike an extra couple of hours to see the waterfall - to Maya there was no question that you don’t. Though it hurt me a little to pass up the falls, we chose to head down the valley instead. The decision, I think, was the right one, as we did not get to our little hiking lodge until after 6:00, as the sun was beginning to set - two more hours could have been pretty trying.
In many ways, the hike down the valley was the most impressive part of the journey. We walked through traditional Berber villages built into the hillsides in the valley. Though it sounds a bit cliche, the villages seemed to be functioning much as they had for centuries. Each family had a multi-level house built into the side of the valley, with the bottom floor housing a cow or two. Each of the houses seemed connected in some ways to the other houses in the village, making the whole village appear basically contiguous, with rooftops serving as a flat surface for drying clothes and doing other household tasks. Surrounding the villages are impressive sets of tiered fields, growing crops - barley in winter and vegetables in summer - all with walnut trees throughout. The walnut ends up being a key staple for the Berber in the high mountains; they use all parts of the trees, from the nuts for sale, the leaves for fodder, the bark for fires, and the wood for building. The villages also work communally to tend to flocks of sheep and goats. The villages really felt like they had grown into the hillsides, particularly given that the houses matched the color of the dirt surrounded the village. Some of the villages were distinctly red, while other were more dun/brown, the result of the fact that the houses are made of clay produced from the dirt and rock most readily available. As we walked I couldn’t help seeing northern New Mexico almost everywhere I looked. Both the mountain peaks and the general terrain could be taken directly from the Sangre de Cristo mountains that make up the southern edge of the rockies in NM where I grew up. Furthermore, the construction of the Berber houses with clay/mud construction with wooden ceiling beams had a wildly familiar and comforting feel. Though the Taos Pueblo is built on flat ground, the construction has a very similar feel. As we hiked, we regularly passed men and their mules - each family has a mule -which do a remarkable amount of work up and down the hillsides. We also passed a bunch of children, all of whom poked their heads out and said, “bonjour, bonjour, bonjour!” Each school in the villages has two teachers, one who teaches French and Math and one that teaches Arabic and the Quran. It was pretty fascinating to hike past the tiny schools with Maya; the schools in the villages serve kids from ages 6-12, after which most students stop their schooling. If they want to continue, they need to go to the middle/high school in Asni, which is a six-seven hour walk out of the valley. If they attend, they walk to school on Monday, spend the week in student housing, and walk back on Saturday. Most simply begin life in the village at age 12, their education ended. Maya got to think about what it would mean to be months from being done with her education. She might take the deal if it meant she got a mule...she liked the mules...and the cows and sheep.
Our arrival at the small guest lodge in one of these villages was hilarious and delightful. When we arrived - tired and ready for a break - the older Berber owner offered us a stool outside and a pair of slippers. We took off our shoes, put on the slippers, and he invited us inside. Once inside the lodge (if four rooms counts as a lodge), he pointed to our hands and said in very broken English “wash hands,” indicating that we should hold out or hands. He took a silver water shaker - I know that is not a thing, but is the best description I have. He shook some scented water on our hands and handed us a towel. Then, he pointed to a bowl of dates and said, “in milk,” pointing to a bowl of milk, so we each took a date, dipped it in milk and ate it. We were fascinated -fair to say that we have never been told to dip a date in a bowl of milk before, but who are we to say no. After that he showed us our room and said, “You shower and come up for tea.” We hadn’t questioned him before this, so we didn’t figure that now was the time to start. We showered and went upstairs to the common room for tea.
Much to our delight, we ended up sharing the lodge that night with two British couples on different trekking itineraries. The conversation was lively and fun.One couple explained that they regularly went to the Globe to see Shakespeare, and I ended up answering a bunch of questions about Shakespeare, making for a pretty unlikely scene - An American explaining Shakespeare to the English in the mountains in Morocco. They then asked some questions about the structure of American government - they had just started watching The West Wing, and they didn’t quite understand the House and Senate. They were quite pleased to get their questions straightened out, but they admitted to being frustrated with The West Wing; they described it as sort of a “liberal fantasy show.” They wanted to know why everyone was so nice and civil to each other...they didn’t believe it could be real. They believed House of Cards was more accurate. When the other British couple joined the conversation, we shifted to a conversation about Brexit - one woman woefully pessimistic and the rest holding onto a fleeting hope that it might not actually come to pass. We were intrigued to hear a similar conversation about someone else’s political situation. Our meal was delightful and delicious - a tagine, of course - but food is always better after a full day of hiking, and we were abed and asnooze before 9:00. The following two days were much the same - long days of hiking through Berber villages with delightful stops for lunches. Hussain proved to be a wonderful guide, sharing his knowledge of the terrain and the people. After the initial climb, Maya settled into the days of walking nicely - she has been getting fit and strong, and she could have hiked much more than we did. We were a little sad that we had not signed up for the hike to summit Toubkal, but it is nice to have another trip to look forward to - a reason to come back.
