Telouet, Morocco- Day 4

We spent the night and first 15 minutes of the morning in Warzazat, which contains an ancient Kasbah, a fortified city, built in the 12^th century.

From Warzazat we drove about an hour, maybe longer, to another more remote Kasbah where they filmed The Mummy.

The views from the top were incredible too. Being able to see the green trees of the Oasis, the red-ish brown of the desert sand, and white snow capped mountains in the distance was so awesome to see. How often do you see all three landscapes in the same picture?

We spent about an hour there and then drove another hour or so into the Atlas Mountains where we met up with old, rickety vans that took us 45 minutes off the main road and to the remote Berber village of Telouet. And when I say old and rickety I mean it, one even broke down on the way to Telouet. We ate a quick lunch then took a tour of the village and the ancient Kasbah near by.

The most intriguing part of the Kasbah is the magnificent palace it contains.

In the winter of 1893 the Sultan of Morocco and his army of roughly 3,000 men were stranded in this part of the labyrinth-like Atlas Mountains. Madani and T'hami Glaoui took care of the Sultan and his army, and in return they received political power. Their power continued to grow until they were almost as highly regarded as the Sultan until they were disloyal to the king a number of years later, which ultimately lead to their downfall.

Though what I found most fascinating during our exploration was that there was a shul in this little village.

Our guide told us that the last Jews left 40 years ago. It’s incredible to think that Jews lived this far out in village some where in the mountains. Maybe my pictures can somewhat convey the remoteness of this village. And may I remind you that we drove for 45 minutes on a narrow, very poorly paved road while we saw nothing but rolling mountains of brown, red, green, and even some hints of purple outside our windows. There were virtually no signs of human life along the way with the exception of the road we were driving on and the extremely small village we passed along the way.

I know the pictures are the best part of the blog, but I promise you will not regret it if you read the rest of it.

After exploring the Berber village we had free time for a few hours until dinner. A friend and I watched the sunset while discussing how freaking awesome everything has been for us and how fortunate we are to be where we are (shout out to mom and dad. THANK YOU!!). 

After dinner we enjoyed the local Berber’s Achwaj, a type of music created by the Jews, believe it or not, around 850 years ago. We listened to, danced to, and even played the traditional music for hours.

I even had to go inside at one point to put my feet by the heater. 

At about 10 o’clock ten of us took a lantern lit walk to a field far enough away from the lights of the village to stargaze. The moon was bright and the wind fierce, which deterred people from staying, but the five of us that stuck around did not regret it one bit. Even though the moon lit up the sky, we decided to stay out and make a fire.

We walked even further away from the village and collected wood for about 45 minutes. We walked back to where we left the lantern and began to make our fire. It took just about everything we collected and a wall of rocks to block the wind to get it going, but we made our own fire. We ignored the biting wind and enjoyed the warmth and of course the feeling of accomplishment from the fire we worked so hard to start. We didn’t care that the moon was too bright see all the stars, we just savored the beautiful views of the surrounding snowcapped mountains which the moon illuminated. Everything about that night was incredible, or in other words, how often do you get to spend time dancing with Berber people, after eating their delicious couscous for dinner, and then rough it like Bear Grylls by making a fire under the stars in the middle of the Atlas Mountains?

Next we’re on our way to the big, developed cities Marakech, Casablanca, and Fes, but we finally got our real, authentic Moroccan experience, and it ended with a bang.

“I realize my ignorance the more I travel.”- Peter Geffen