Today we left the pre-desert country for the magnificent High Atlas Mountain landscape, crossing the Tizin’Tichka pass at 2260m.

Along the way we made a couple more ‘WC and coffee’ stop. Our first stop included a visit to an ‘Amlou’ presentation. We watched as a few women demonstrated how they crushed almonds and extracted the oil. Then we were led into the ‘showroom’ (sales room?) and shown all the wonderful products were made from the oil extracted from almonds.

Our next stop was at ??Zerkten?, Across the road from the restaurant was a place for tourist busses to park and let the tourists view the mountains and maybe buy some souvenir trinkets from the sellers lining the street.

We headed into the Toubkal National Park, passing through small villages on winding mountain roads, and finally, after 5 hours in the minivan, arrived at the village of Imlil. We had repacked our luggage, putting only what we might need for our overnight up in the mountains in our backpacks. We left our luggage in the van, where our driver would spend the night watching over it. Our backpacks were loaded onto the backs of a couple of donkeys who would take them up to our mountain gîte.

And so began our 1-hour hike from Imlil up to the little village of Aroumd (Aremd). The hike was great! Not too strenuous, and although the air was cool, the climb was uphill enough so that we were not cold. There was snow in the mountains all around us.

Soon we arrived at our simple mountain gîte. Our backpacks were already in the cabin, and our rooms were assigned to us by our tour guide. Accommodation here was multi-share, with four to six beds in each room. Dave and Marylou would get their own room, while the four remaining men shared a room, while the women were divided into 2 more bedrooms. Each room had a small portable heater. All of us would share the 4 bathrooms and 3 showers.

Out on the patio, our host welcomed us with glasses of hot tea and a couple of big bowls of popcorn.

Michael and Lisa (the ‘Aussies’) and Naomi and I went for a walk through the small village and up into the hills. Men were herding their goats from off the roofs of their buildings into smaller ‘pens’ for the night. Donkeys also were herded home along the narrow rocky trails. Young children were kicking a soccer ball around in the ‘town square’. Women were busy cooking supper; some on an outdoor fire of little sticks.

When we got back to our gîte we sat down at two tables and our host brought out  a homemade dinner of delicious soup and bread, followed by a big dish of couscous and chicken. Fresh local orange slices for dessert.

A workout on the trail up the mountain, fresh air, a big delicious dinner, and cozy blankets to keep us warm in crisp cool air — it didn’t take long until we were in our beds, doing our best to snore in harmony.