Morocco – Todra Gorge & Ait Benhaddou 22/10/16 – 24/10/16

Day 7, 8 & 9
Today we spent around 5 hours on our bus travelling to Toda Gorge, stopping several times for photo opportunities along the way. Today Gorge is said to be one of Morocco’s natural sights, with high cliff tops and lush green tree filled valleys which rises over 250 meters to form it’s dramatic scenery. One of the stops we made was a walk through farmland to a ruined village. Another was a walk to a vast oasis museum of El Khorbat, then continuing to the Dades Valley which is at the foothills of the Atlas mountains where the views were of red mud bricked homes perched on the hill side with magnificent rocks sculptured by the varying winds. Once there our guide took us on a walk and stated we would need rain jackets. Most took his advice, whereas a few didn’t, (me and Tina being in the latter). The walk was really great, yet bitter cold with the winds around. Within 10 minutes the heavens opened, guess which of us were smiling, the rain – more like hailstones – came from the sky at a terrific speed and pounder our bare arms and legs with such force we were almost crying. The group ran to a nearby wall and to take some shelter, until the rain eased. Within minutes the few with no coats headed back to our digs, whilst the others continued. Once the other returned they showed us some remarkable photos of Morocco’s only canyon soaring hundreds of meters above the ground with a gorgous looking stream at its base.
The following day we had a choice of 2 walks, the first being a 10km trek, taking around 4 hours, up and over the mid Atlas mountains visiting a nomadic village who live in dug out caves, or a 4km walk through its lush green oasis valleys alongside a river. I opted for the mountain trek and Tina for the oasis valley walk. The former was heavy going getting up the mountain along a singled narrow path of very loose rocks with scary “drop offs” cascading to its base. However once at the top we were met by the chief Berber who made us some hot mint tea and showed us around his village. All in all his village is made up of 12 family members who live in caves, hand dug out, on the edge of the mountain. Their lives very simple, but all met us with huge smiles. We were asked not to take photos of the women as they had 2 special guests in their village, these were the brides of his 2 sons and their wedding had only taken place the day before. The ladies were preparing the evening meal. When I say preparing, I mean they were in the midst of slaughtering a goat in a tent next to where we were having tea! A very serial moment. On the way down the views as ever were amazing. Once at the base we were joined by the others who took the valley walk, had lunch and headed back to our hotel.
(T) The oasis valley walk took us through the towns extensive vegetable plots with numerous plants and trees planted around man made water runs for irrigation. At the end of the valley we walked along the bottom of the Gorge till we met up with the others for lunch.

Ait Benhaddou
Back on the bus for the 4 hour drive to Ait Benhaddou, again travelling through great scenery. A visit to Kasbah Amridil, the location of some film scenes ( Hannah, Black Hawk Down). A gorgous little kasbah where we went into what was a traditional house over numerous floors with 5 ovens. We had a visit to the Atlas movie studio where numerous film scenes were made including Jewel in the Nile, the Way Back, Asterix, Cleopatra, Gladiator and the Game of Thrones scene………Back to the hotel where we had a cooking class to learn how to make the famous cuisine of tagine couscous.