Explore The southern oases routes
The direct route between Marrakesh and Ouarzazate, the Tizi n’Tichka (N9) is a spectacular piece of engineering, its pulse-racing series of switchbacks providing evermore jaw-dropping views until it eventually crests the central High Atlas at its eponymous pass. It was built to replace the old caravan route to the Drâa and the south, which was controlled during the nineteenth century and much of the twentieth by the legendary Glaoui family, the greatest and most ambitious of all the Berber tribal leaders – their kasbah-headquarters, a vast complex of buildings abandoned only in 1956, still stands at Telouet, less than an hour from the main road.
Arrow-straight as it runs out from Marrakesh across the Haouz Plain, the Tizi n’Tichka soon contours forest slopes high above the Oued Ghdat valley, twisting past small villages and fields as it heads to Taddert, the last significant village on the north side of the pass – though most traffic now stops a kilometre on at busy Upper Taddert. The road thereafter climbs in an amazing array of hairpin bends to reach pastureland (tichka means “high pasture”) before a final pull up to the Tichka pass itself (2260m), marked by cafés and the obligatory souvenir stall or two; not far down on the south side of the pass is the turning to Telouet and the Ounila Valley. The main road south winds down through Igherm, 10km further on and home to a well-restored agadir (to find someone to unlock it, ask at the roadside hotel, Chez Mimi), gradually flattening out until it reaches the turn-off to Aït Benhaddou, just 19km before Ouarzazate.
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The Ounila Valley: walking the back road to Aït Benhaddou
The Ounila Valley: walking the back road to Aït Benhaddou
As hard as it is to imagine today, the tranquil Ounila Valley, set amid high, parched hillsides and edged in by remarkably coloured scree slopes, served as the main route over the Atlas until the French constructed the Tizi n’Tichka to the west. Despite finally being paved in 2011, the road (the P1506) sees relatively little traffic and makes for a fine two-day walk, following the Oued Ounila as it snakes south to Aït Benhaddou.
The scattered communities here make abundant use of the narrow but fertile valley, which slowy unveils a wealth of dark red and crumbling kasbahs and agadirs, cliff dwellings, terraced orchards and olive trees – and everywhere children calling to each other from the fields, the river or the roadside. The first stop, after 12km, is Anemiter (2hr 30min walk from Telouet), one of the best-preserved fortified villages in Morocco and well worth a visit, even if you go no further. Leaving the village, the main track clings to the valley side, alternately climbing and descending, but with a general downhill trend as you make your way south. After 3km, you cross a sturdy bridge, beyond which the road follows the left bank of the river to the hamlet of Assako (2hr 30min from Anemiter), where it climbs to the left round some spectacular gorges before dropping steeply; walkers should aim to get beyond this exposed high ground before camping. The trail passes the little village of Tourhat (around 3hr 30min from Assako) before bringing you to Tamdaght (another 3hr), a scattered collection of buildings with a classic kasbah. Just 6km from Tamdaght (1hr 15min), along a lush river valley, lies Aït Benhaddou.
