Our bikepacking tour of Morocco was fundamentally inspired by the Route of the Caravans that bikepacking.com had been working on for years, and as always with our big bike rides, we started on that route, veered off it, back on, back off, and finally way off into a region that The Route didn’t really get into. There is also a (true) bikepacking race that happens annually called the Atlas Mountains race, and the organizers seem to modify it annually, so there were times that we were using that route as well. However, one of the fun aspects of bikepacktouring is developing your own route on the fly – enabled by the Komoot and Ride With GPS apps (Google has NO bike rides in all of Morocco?!! Weird…) and since much of the southern half of the Route of the Caravans goes into the Sahara and the October heat wave (nearly 15 degrees F over normal) the Sahara sounded sub-optimal, we stayed in the higher/cooler Atlas mountains.
There are a few primary tourist zones in Morocco: the cities (Fez, Marrakesh, and a few others), the deep Sahara desert, and a couple of cool gorges called Todra and Dades. We caught up with Tim and Sarah in the lower bit of the Dades gorge (where a Zion-like canyon gives way to “a broader “Fig Valley”) and it happened that a small hotel where we stayed with Tim and Sarah was the jumpoff for a well-known hike into the “Monkey Fingers” canyon that’s a tributary of Fig Valley. We took a rest day and hiked up the canyon, and for a while felt like we were in familiar terrain of desert slot canyons:
Only in this canyon we had a nice stop in a cool cave for tea; something that southern Utah slots don’t quite have:
We needed some money and were told that a hotel a coupla kms away had a cash machine, and once there we were proudly told that the hotel was “the only 5-star hotel in the valley!” We didn’t stay there (5 star prices as well, even by US standards) but we did take the opportunity for a nice cold beer after a day of slot-groveling:
The first in a few weeks; Morocco – like most Muslim countries – is pretty much NA (and they have some good NA beers too).
The Dades Gorge kinda forms the Northeastern side of the High Atlas mountains, and as The Route continued south we veered west into the mountains, and started a series of days of big climbs and descents. And they were amazing; we love riding in the mountains, and have spent many days doing big climbs all over the place, and these rides were as good as any climbs/descents we’ve done anywhere, rivaling those of the Pyrenees, Alps, Beartooths, etc.
Nice and twisty and very aesthetic, and fortunately the pitches were mostly more manageable in the 5-8% range than the super steep stuff (12-18%) that we’d ground up in the heat in the Rif mountains. And the best part about them was that there was virtually no traffic; we’d see a car once every 15 minutes, and we had a couple of days where we saw literally a handful of cars, and the roads were basically single lane roads. And unlike the more temperate forested mountains of the north, these desert mountains allowed long views down the snaky descents, so while we got surprised a couple of times, most of the time we were well aware of where the cars, trucks, and motos were as we streaked down. The “motos” were either locals on scooters or – as often – Europeans on their enduro motorcycles in packs of 5-10; they always waved at us, but were a bit unnerving at times as they too were loving the ripping descents and – for them – ripping climbs.
The day after we left the Dades gorge we found ourselves in a tiny village at the base of a 3000’ climb pretty early, so we stopped early for athe day to hit the climb in the morning with fresh legs.
There were two pretty rustic guesthouses in the tiny village, and I kinda groaned as I peered over the little patio of our place to see not only cows – which was fine; we had a favorable breeze but chickens and the associated roosters. The quietest villages in the evening could become a cacophony of dogs barking in the early night (and sacked out during the day, resting up for a night of barking) and as often happens in rural areas – roosters somehow sensing daybreak still hours out. But the Berber homes are made of really thick walls, and we had a good night of sleep after having a nice chat with a Dutch mother/daughter who surprised us by also finding themselves in this village and at Mustafa’s place:
With tajine-powered legs (more on that later) we slowly made our way up the long climb to what turned out to be the highest pass in the country at just over 3000 meters (9800’) and as I rolled to a stop there was – to my surprise – another cyclist. He turned out to be Livio, a French cycling enthusiast who – coincidentally – also started in Montpellier, France (where he lives) but instead of ferrying from Barcelona to Tangier like we did he “just” rode across Spain to Gibraltar to get to Morocco (about 700 miles). Livio is accustomed to long rides by himself; not long ago he also left from his house and rode many passes in the Alps before going through the Balkans, Turkey, Georgia, Armenia, Iran, and Afghanistan (in the winter!) to finish in Kabul. Take a look at a global map: that’s a crazy trip! And he was solo. As Livio put it: “I was looking for a big adventure, and I got it!” It turned out that we were on a similarly-flexible trajectory and pace as Livio, so we spent a nice 3 or 4 days riding with him, always amazed at his ability to climb with a too-heavy bike and a propensity to smoke cigarettes!
Over the next couple of days we were able to ride over 5 of the highest passes in the country – all just shy of 3000m – and all had the fantastic cycling qualities mentioned earlier. I realized just now that there is a pro bike race called – not surprisingly – the Tour of Morocco that happens in early March that’s clearly not as well-known as the big classic tours, but with the climbing opportunities that exist on the incredible roads in the Atlas I can imagine that the Tour of Morocco is every bit as hard as the Tour de France, Giro d’Italia, and Vuelta d’Espana.
Our general idea was to get to the Taghia Gorge, which we were first told about by Kris Erickson. Kris is a climbing and ski guide who originally hails from Montana and now spends most of his life in Chamonix, but he and his wife started going to Morocco for climbing and skiing and got so enamored with the country, the people, and the adventures there that they built a house just downcanyon from the Taghia Gorge, a well-known climbing destination that people feel is comparable to Yosemite and the Dolomites in terms of scope, difficulty, and beauty, but with a fraction of the people. Though we didn’t have climbing gear (people have ridden around Morocco on a climbing trip; talk about heavy bikes!), and even if we did we are far from the caliber necessary to climb there, any place that is reminiscent of the Dolomites or Yosemite is a place we want to check out! Turns out, riding to the Taghia and the hiking there is indeed amazing:
The village of Taghia is tiny; indeed, it’s barely more than a few houses, and the rugged gravel road going into this box canyon was only created a few years ago; prior to that climbers took mules up there from the slightly bigger town of Zaouiat Ahansal where Kris and Chloe live (Chloe is the director of a nonprofit that empowers local women to have better lives than simply slaving !` in the fields). The main Taghia guest house is run by Said; we assumed that he would kind of be a climber dood from Marrakech or somesuch who would be renting gear and dispensing climbing beta, but turns out that Said is a local village guy who’s built out a house big enough to house a maybe 30 or so climbers a night, that he fortifies with good food. And rare for Morocco, he is able to provide breakfast very early, since many of the climbs require steep approach hikes and are upwards of 20 pitches! Said takes it all in stride and – like so many Moroccans, is super humble, quiet, and helpful, and I would bet he’s a legend in the adventurous-climber community.
Taghia gorge is the headwaters of the Ahansel river, which is the one river in the country that I knew of; a friend (legendary river runner Alex Aitken) first told me about a few years ago, and I was keen to check that out. I just kinda figured that the river would just build below Zaouiat Ahansal and we’d be able to follow it and I’d be able to see it as we went, but we were on a pretty rugged road that climbed 2000’ above a remote gorge, with no view of the whitewater; as rugged as any river canyon in the American West, and I think in an entire afternoon we saw one or two cars (there were times that we saw so few cars that I was a little worried about having a bike-stopping problem; does anybody travel on these roads?). Our destination for the day was the Cathedral des Roches, which is an impressive feature with a Half Dome-scale:
We got to the village in time to do a hike to the top, which was a fun diversion from the bike:
The standard river trip starts from here and again enters a remote gorge before entering a reservoir; it runs in the spring on good snowmelt.
We went over yet another pass exiting the canyon, and had a lonnggg, thrilling descent down to the reservoir, which was super fun, but put us back down into the heat zone of under 3000 feet. And disappointingly, it was where we bid adieu to our French friend; he wanted to go where we had been, and we wanted to go where he had been. Ash and I carried along for only about 7 more miles on a hilly road into a hot wind to a hotel we hoped was open; due to the long term drought there The reservoir is only 20% full and with the shore now hundreds of feet below full pool the lakeshore development has literally dried up.
But indeed, the hotel was open…and had a pool….
The next few days were basically spent rolling along the western foothills of the Atlas mountains; while we could see the flats that spread out in the haze below, we continued to be on mostly one-lane little roads – both paved and gravel – hopping from one village to another and staying in guest houses and hotels that sometimes only had us as customers. We continued to be amazed at a) how well-built and beautiful the places were where we stayed, b) how genuinely nice and friendly the proprietors (and all the people we interacted with) were, and c) how good the riding continued to be. Literally in a month of riding we had two couple-of-hour sections that we agreed were a bit busy and/or boring, which is extraordinary; every country has its suboptimal riding between The Goods, but it seemed to us that wherever we went in Morocco was sublime riding.
We were now tracking towards Marrakech, and near Marrakech is the highest peak in Morocco: Toubkal, which tops out at 4100m (13,600’). While Kris had told us that it was super touristy, Livio had hiked it and had a good experience doing it in a day (most folks take at least 2) and we realized yet again that we are tourists! So we thought we’d give it a go. But as we closed in on the village of Imlil that’s the jumpoff point to climb the peak, for a variety of reasons we decided not to do it: cooling weather (finally!), we had to have a guide, we’d have crippled quads from over 6000’ of descending after a month of nearly 100% cycling and not much downhill hiking, and a bit of a schedule for the next phase of our Big Trip. Though indeed we are Tourists with a capital T, there was also a little distaste for going to do The Biggest Peak That Everyone Does Because It’s The Biggest. So in lieu of going up the peak we chose to ride up to The Moroccan ski resort of Oukaimeden, which was 6000 foot climb out of the valley, with a nice hotel a ways up to break it up. This turned out to be fabulous; once again the climb was 6% for about 20 miles, mostly one-lane (due to the other lane getting buried by rockfall that was never cleared):
The halfway house hotel was great:
With a guy harvesting saffron (in the morning, of course!)
And the next day we finished the climb around noon in a cold wind, where we were finally able to put on some of the cold weather gear we’d hauled all through the heat of our trip:
And launched into a steep, gorgeous gravel descent towards Marrakech:
And indeed, there was actually new snow up on Toubkal, so our decision was a good one.
Once in the valley above Marrakech we decided not to ride into “town”; we have made that mistake before, and even with the cool cycling apps it looked like miles of grim riding to get into the heart of the city, so our bikes got strapped onto a taxi one more time and we waded into the city.
Marrakesh is a busy, loud, and stinky (diesel and gas engines from a bazillion cars, trucks, and motos, horse whizz and shit from the tourist buggies) as I imagined it would be, and the Medina (market) is as huge and dizzying as it seems like a market could be. It’s said that “you can buy anything in the Medina!” But that’s not quite right: as long as it’s leather, silver, rugs, soccer jerseys, or artsy trinkets there’s a bazillion of each, and as cyclists continuing on to another adventure we didn’t really partake…..except to buy a rug.
A classic experience that ultimately was pretty fun for all, and will be super nice in Ashley’s she-shed:
We sent it by Moroccan post; our camping gear still hasn’t made it to Innsbruck yet, but hopefully that happens soon and our carpet makes it back to SLC, Inshallah!
We did go to the famous Big Square (there’s probably an Arabic name for it, but that’s what the locals called it) that’s adjacent to the Medina, where indeed there was some fun music and more stands selling pomegranate juice:
Though we knew it was coming, it was a huge bummer for us to see lots of the Barbary Macaque monkeys on chained leashes held by shady-looking characters and in tiny cages after seeing the endangered monkeys wandering around in the woods a couple of weeks ago. There are also ‘snake charmers” with defanged cobras and mouths sewn shut….I was out on that. But so it goes. Hopefully the word spreads and those guys aren’t compensated enough by savvy tourists to keep those practices going.
Overall a fabulous trip! The heat at the beginning was tough, but that improved a lot as we climbed into the mountains and stayed there, and the riding went from good to great as we continued south into the High Atlas, with the Taghia Gorge and the Oukaimeden zone being the highlights for us, as well as being able to ride and chuckle with Livio for a few days.
We are now in Sicily after a long day of flying a long ways to go not that far from Morocco (up to Paris and back down) to ride all over that cool island, and we’ll no doubt have some fun tales from this phase as well, but I’ll probably do a follow up to talk about some other aspects of Morocco like the people, food, vibe etc.