Tallest Point in Northern Africa: Mt. Toubkal Two Day Trek
- dennisvink8
- Jul 7, 2023
- 4 min read
Tallest Point in Northern Africa:
Mt. Toubkal 2 Day Trek
The tallest point in Northern Africa is in the Atlas Mountains of Morocco on the peak Mt. Toubkal. Standing at 4,165 meters (13,671 ft) it is a beautiful place
and a special place. My friends and I set off to climb this peak in two days starting in the remote village of Imlil. We went with Atlas Mountain Trekking who we highly recommend they were great and picked us up from Marrakech and drove us back to Marrakech at the end as well. Recommend them!
The schedule looked like this:
Day 1:
Hike from Imlil (1800 meters) to the Refuge (3200 meters) about 11 km and 1400 meters of elevation gain. Took about 4-5 hours and it is never too steep
Day 2:
Wake up early around 3:30 am, eat breakfast then begin the summit attempt
Summit (4165 meters), then hike back down to the refuge, have a quick lunch and then hike all the way back down to Imlil.
A lot of people tend to hike the mountain in two days as the elevation is a very gradual increase. If you know altitude doesn't mix with you well, definitely opt to take an extra day to acclimate better.
ALTITUDE IS NO JOKE!
Day 1:
Marrakech to Imlil (70 km Drive)
Imlil to Refuge (11 km Hike)
Our first day consisted of about a 1.5 hour drive from Marrakech, one of the four imperial cities in Morocco, to Imlil one of the largest villages in the Atlas Mountains. Imil is where we met our guide Mohammed and began our trek. After dropping off our extra gear with the tour company we began to hike.
The first day was just over 11 km (7 miles) of hiking to the refuge where we would be sleeping for the night. Along the way there are little huts selling water and snacks as well as souvenirs. Make sure you have cash handy. We had about 20 Moroccan Dirham equivalent to around $6.
A 1.5 liter water bottle will usually cost 2-3 Dirham, in the mountains it can cost 8-10 dirham so be prepared for that.
PRO TIP#1: Buy snacks beforehand because the food and water is always going to cost more in these huts.
Nearing halfway we stopped for lunch in one of these huts prepared by our cook who accompanied us up the mountain to the refuge. The pictures show us having traditional Tagine.
Tagine is what the clay pot it is made in is called. It is a sort of stew with beef or lamb pieces. No pork of course as Morocco is a Muslim State and pork is not Halal!
Sounds good to me as I’m Jewish anyways hahahaha.
As well as fresh veggies and rice we indulged.
PRO TIP#2: Buy Bottled Water, usually I hate doing that because the plastic and the unnecessary cost but WATER in Morocco, can notoriously make people sick. It is SAFE but we were only in the country for three days and we didn't want to ruin our chances of summiting because of some bad water so we bought bottled water along the way
After a nice lunch we continued on nearing the refuge.
As we came up to the refuge the valley opened up and there sat the multiple buildings of the refuge almost bending in with the mountains behind it. The history behind the refuge is very interesting.
Following World War 1 the French Alpine club
began to climb the Atlas Mountains and quickly fell in love. In 1938 they built the first refuge in the mountains for the purpose of exploring this amazing range.
But after arriving and choosing a room we went to dinner and has another splendid meal of veggies and more Tagine. We talked to others in the refuge and met people from everywhere. By 9 pm we were in bed with alarms set for 3:30 am the next morning
Day 2:
Refuge to Summit (6km)
Summit to Refuge to Imlil (17km)
3:30 AM we were up to the sound of our alarms along with the rest of the hut.
On any morning that sound is dreaded to any level but at 3:30 am in the mountains of Morocco that sound might as well be the worst sound ever.
Getting up we quickly dressed and by 4:30 am we began our trek up the trail.
During peak season there can be upwards of 150-200 people summiting the mountain on a given day. Lucky for us we were there in June a slightly less busy time for the mountain. So we were with probably around 60 other people going for the summit. We began a slow trek up. The Atlas Mountains were supposedly created millions years ago by the collision of the African and Eurasian tectonic plates. For that reason the rock is predominately volcanic and very loose. When we were ascending, in early June, there was snow but barely any on the trail. So we were hiking on extremely loose rock which became a bigger problem on the way down.
By sunrise 6:30 am we were above 4000 meters. At 7:30 am we reached the summit at 4167 meters and admired the glory and absolutely beautiful weather we had.
PROTIP#3: Hiking Poles are never a cop out if you can rent them, you should. There are plenty of places in Imlil to rent some poles
Of course we took some amazing pictures and started the hard part the trek all the way back to Imlil. After making it to the refuge we opted to pack up and go immediately back as we needed to drive all the way back to Marrakech that night.
So we returned down the trail and after another 11km back from the refuge to Imlil we loaded the car and returned back in Marrakech.
All in all, highly recommend this experience if you make it Morocco. It shows you a different side of an incredibly diverse country. Anybody can do it, don't be intimated by the length or the height of the mountain. You should be relatively fit but trust in yourself because if you put your mind to it, you can do more than you could even imagine.
Comments