Atlas Mountains Traverse

Imlil to Aït Bouguemez · Morocco

Moderate8 daysAfrica~£900 est.

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Overview

The High Atlas traverse from Imlil to the Aït Bouguemez runs west to east across the roof of Morocco — out of the walnut and cherry terraces below Jebel Toubkal (4,167m), over a succession of passes near 3,000m, and down into the broad green Aït Bouguemez, the 'Valley of Happy People', beneath the M'Goun massif (4,071m). It is a walk through a living Berber landscape: mules still carry the loads, the paths are the ones villagers use to reach market, and each night ends in a village gîte with tagine cooked over a wood fire. The rhythm is what stays with you. Mornings climb through irrigated barley terraces to bare passes where the Sahara-facing side of the range glows brown-pink; afternoons descend to villages of rammed-earth houses stacked up the hillside. On the Yagour plateau, Bronze Age petroglyphs are cut into pastures the shepherds still graze each summer, and in Aït Bouguemez itself the fortified granary of Sidi Moussa crowns a conical hill with the whole valley floor spread below. Heat and snow bracket the season: April–May and September–October are ideal, mid-summer is punishing below 2,000m, and winter closes the passes. Arrange a licensed mountain guide and muleteer in Imlil or Marrakech — around £60–90 per person per day including gîtes and meals — and carry cash, because there are no ATMs between the trailheads.