In 2012, we planned a tour through Morocco’s High Atlas: walking through the mountains in a group, with aguide. But that trip was canceled by the tour-operator due to a lack of participants.
This year, we found a trip to Morocco with another operator, and no matter the number of travelers: that trip would be executed, with an English speaking local guide. He would lead us over the Saghro mountains – an area created and formed by volcanic activities, and into the Sahara, both rocky and sandy environments. Walks of about 6 hours from one location to the other, where the luggage was transported by mules of camels, we would stleep in tents – or, in the desert, in open air.
Normally, it is quite warm in May, but this year temperatures were modest, and due to the amount of wind, it was well bearable: temperatures around 30 degrees in the Saghro and about 35 in the desert – considered mild conditions.
In the Saghro we could walk 6 hours with some stops underway, but in the Sahara we walked for 4 hours to a place with lots of shadow, and we would take a siësta for a few hours, to avoid the hottest time of the day; after that, it would be a walk of 2 hours to the camp.
In between, we visited the Todra gorge, but that was somewhat disappointing: the original gravel riverbed, once suitable for four-wheel drives only, is now fitted with a concrete road to allow more traffic to the inland beyond the gorge; needed for the local economy, but it spoils the wildness of the area – and allows more and more ‘traders’ selling their stuff to tourists like us.
After all trekking, we spent the last four days in Marrakech – the first day in a large hotel outside the old city, as part of the trip itself, and the rest in an original old-city house – a riad – that has been restored and converted to a hotel.
Of course I tracked all walks, and some of the intermediate rides (by our own bus), and took a lot of pictures.