Memories of Morocco - Part V - Dadès Gorges by bike

Yesterday we started out on paved roads and after lunch were on some amazing dirt roads – a highlight for me. Today we rode from the hotel starting out on a climb. These roads lead us through some more breathtaking scenery through some of Morocco’s oldest rock formations. If you have ever seen the Cadillac commercial on a wild road in Morocco, you’ll get an aerial view of the roads we took on this day. Needless to say, the road is all up or down, but mostly it is up.

I am riding alone until I stop for a nature break, then Scotty and Anne appear and we ride together to the lunch stop. There is some construction on the road that is very odd to see in this country: big CAT excavators and loaders at the foot of the mountain digging up rock to make new roads, an unwelcome break in the peace and quiet.

The river continues through the valley and greenery naturally abounds in the lowlands. The climbing seems endless. Coupled with the effort of the climb and the intense sun, today is the warmest day yet. With the increased elevation come some incredible views of a most unique topography.

The mountains are bone dry, horizontal lines revealing the shifting of the earth’s crust. The area which now forms the Dadès Gorges lay at the bottom of the sea millions of years ago. Great quantities of sediment were deposited around giant coral reefs, and over time this material became compacted into a variety of sedimentary rocks such as sandstone and limestone. Eventually, the movement of the earth’s crust caused the region to rise above the sea, forming the Atlas Mountains and surrounding landscape.

What goes up must come down.. eventually. In this case, it held true: At the conclusion of our descent, around a wide curve, is a small concrete bridge over a flowing river. The lunch van is there and tea is ready!  We had to coordinate with the other vehicles bringing injured people and others not keen on riding on cliff edges to the lunch spot. With the extra time, we decided to ride further down the road but quickly encountered more road construction which deterred us from continuing. So we headed back to the bridge. There I discovered a single track trail along the river that was peppered with sharp rocks. I rode as far as I could before it became too jagged for my basic skills. Back at the lunch stop, we set up the tarp on the ground near the river and basked in the sun.

To fill time, Anne and I did handstands against the bridge and then when the girls arrived we got them doing some mobility exercises. We got as far as the hips before taking a break, as the sun was quickly dehydrating us. When everyone arrived, the food came out. Lunch was one of the highlights of the day as our driver/cook typically chose a quiet, scenic spot at the side of the road to set up. They cooked our lunch and brought it to us in courses: baskets of bread, cheese, chopped raw vegetables, oily fish (usually sardines or tuna), some kind of pasta, and tagine. They poured numerous glasses of mint tea and finished with oranges and bananas. Needless to say, we never went hungry and usually over-ate.

On this day, we piled in the vans and drove back to the hotel to spend a leisurely afternoon on the terrace overlooking the rock wall of mountain opposite our hotel. It was a good opportunity to do laundry and hang it out in the sun to dry. We had multi-course meals here including soup, salad, tagine main course and dessert. Our waiter, Ibrahim, was warm and engaging young man, who liked to interact with his patrons. He took a shine to our friend Wei and joked about marrying her. He told many jokes and kept us all laughing throughout the evening, sending us to bed the previous night thinking about his favourite riddle. Tonight we had drummers and singers to entertain. We slept well that night.

Another full day. Tomorrow we would leave the gorges by car and cross the open plains driving to the start of a mountain pass that was one hundred per cent dirt. I could hardly wait!