Morocco - day trips

Posted by Anura Samara, 3 January 2015

We took two day trips from Marrakesh. Both were with the same driver, and even better we were the only passengers on the second trip which meant it was totally customised to us!

Kasbah Ait-Benhaddou and Ouzarzate

This was a trip out to the desert regions of Morocco. It’s not like a desert of the imagination, with rolling sand dunes as far as the eye can see – instead, its wide swathes of open land, with sparse vegetation, crumbling mud walls and basic agriculture. Even with sparse settlements and buildings, it was surprising how many people were out and about – not just on the road but in the fields. Every now and then we would drive through a town which seemed to combine the old and new – short stretches of modern. smooth roads with new street lighting which would suddenly give way to an old fashioned local market spilling across the entire road.

Our first stop was at Kasbah Ait-Benhaddou. We found out that a “kasbah” or “k’sar” is really a fortified village, with the village surround the central area part of the tactics to defeat an attacker ie. they have to navigate a maze of alleys to get to the central area. We discovered this first-hand – you don’t exactly get lost, but you discover multiple paths.

The kasbah is across the river from the new village where the Landcruiser was parked. It’s a wide river which gives a great view of the kasbah set on a hill in the middle of the mostly flat plain. Once you cross the bridge, you enter the maze of narrow lanes – with the aim of continuing up the hill. Along the way, most of the buildings seemed to have been turned into shops or cafes.

The very top of the hill is exclosed in its own defensive wall, which is in various stages of disrepair, and right in the middle is a surprising well-kept building – but you can’t enter it. The main thing to do is walk the walls and enjoy the 360 degree views of the surrounding countryside – the river and valley belong, some rugged escarpments and the plains with signs of greenery.

After visiting Kasbah Ait-Benhaddou, we set off for Ouzarzate. This is supposedly the “Moroccan Hollywood” where lots of films with a desert theme or backdrop have been filmed. There are apparently two large studios there, be we opted instead to visit the Cinema Museum after lunch. What a disappointment? Most of the films that were claimed to have been filmed there seemed to be B-grade movies we had never heard of and everything we saw was really just a set ie. a fake. We walked around really out of a sense of duty to the cash we had parted with at the entrance.

So we crossed the road to have a quick look at the Kasbah Taourt. Instead of taking up the offer of a guide, we wandered aimless around a series of interconnected internal passageways inside a relatively new building, sometimes ending up at a dead end, sometimes ending up double-backing on ourselves and eventually finding our way out again.

Three Valleys

For our second day trip, we were the only passengers which meant that the trip could be adapted to our need.

The Atlas Mountains with snow-capped peaks really dominate the view from Marrakesh and that’s where we headed for.

The first valley was really just a driving experience, as we navigated through a lush valley with a flowing river – very different from the desert driving before.

The second valley was where things got a bit more interactive. We drove along next to a river with lots of ‘cafes’ along the road – the cafes are really small stalls with a variety of different coloured sofas. In fact, some of the cafes are in the middle of the river, accessible by flimsy bridges. We stopped at one of these bridges for some excitement – a simple walk to the other side of the river. The bridge is really just a basic cable affair, with the oddly-shaped timber cut from raw trunks as the flooring. The flooring itself wasn’t held rigidly in place but was simply stabilised by wire, so there was a fair bit of movement as you walked on it. That’s if you could walk across the gaps. Both of us braved the walk to the other side – maybe 20 metres – and back.

From there, we headed further up the valley for a walk to a waterfall. The start of the journey was where the road petered out in a village, where met a guide to take us up the mountain. The lower start of the trail was across the river and past some of the small cafes, through a small collection of souvenir stalls and then up a steep, winding track which involved crossing small streams and clambering over boulders. Absolutely no supports or safety equipment. When we got to the top, there is a small waterfall dropping into a pond – and a cafe as well (no idea how they get their supplies all of the way up there).

Once we got back to the car, the driver took us well and truly off the beaten track through a dirt track high above the valley. It was much more picturesque than simply driving along the main road below, taking us through small villages which looked like they had been passed by the modern world (apart from the ubiquitous satellite dishes). At one point, the track was muddy and strewn with rocks and stumps – after the first attempt, the driver wanted to turn around but with some directions from me he managed to wind through the various obstacles and keep going.

We then started climbing through the mountains. The temperature dropped and the snow became closer. The single lane road is pretty precarious, with cars, buses and heavy trucks all working their way up. We stopped at one point to watch ladies producing argan oil before continuing on, eventually reaching Col du Tichka, the highest mountain pass through the Atlas Mountains. There’s a great view looking down on to the road below where you can really see it twisting and turning back on itself and heavy vehicles struggling to make the climb.

From this height, we then drove to our third valley to stop in a Berber village for lunch. Our destination wasn’t accessible by car, so we had to walk through the village to reach a smaller cluster of buildings on knoll. Our destination was a half-finished house right on the edge – we were introduced to the Berber ladies who would be cooking us lunch, and then we climbed to the roof (or unfinished second story) of the house where the table was prepared for us. It was right on the edge of the roof, with fantastic views across the entire valley. Lunch was the local bread with olive oil and a traditional tagine – the best tasting tagine I’ve had so far. It was an unbelievable location to sit and eat lunch.

This second day trip was a complete contrast to the first, and really showed off the diversity in Morocco – from deserts punctuated with busy towns to lush mountain valleys and isolated villages.

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