Marakech to Taroudant

rendering / uploading on tour takes a lot of time... offcourse it should be 2011 on the title :)


After a good flight and a nighttime bike ride to a campsite north of Marakech I noticed I wasn't in place yet. The weather is nice but I always need to adjust to a new country. In Morocco it took me a little longer than usual. Spent one day on the campsite and around Marakech suburbs (which are mostly depressing). Will spent more time before my flight back.

The first day riding started cycling through Marakech and onwards to the High Atlas mountain range. The snow capped peaks were looming in the distance. After some climbing I made it to the village of Asni were I spent the night at a berber family's house. Lot's of mint tea to bargain about the price. After dinner Mustafa showed me his cheap souvenir collection (offcourse he wanted me to buy stuff) but I wasn't that impressed.

The next day I ended up in a small town in the high Atlas mountains. Even after 70km I was really tired. Haven't done much mountain cycling lately. The Tajine was very good that night.

Climbing to Tizi N Test was really rewarding, I had great views but when I reached the 1900m hight it got cloudy and eve small drops of snow. Drank coffee at the top and started on the chilly downhill dropping from 2100 to 500m in just 30km! To bad about the clouds because the view should be spectacular. Only 55km left to Taroudant. But man the wind was strong. I arrived just before nightfall in the old city. Decided to get a kebab but that didn't really worked out. It reminded me of my "Broodje Yak" experience in China.

Luckily it wasn't that bad and I'm feeling a lot better today!