Ouzoud Falls Day Trip
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Ouzoud Falls is a collection of waterfalls located in the Middle Atlas mountains. The falls are around 93 miles (ca. 150 km) from Marrakesh. A trip to the falls is one of the many day trips that you can take while visiting Marrakesh. I booked my tour through Get Your Guide and had a great experience. After I booked on the site, I received an email from Marrakesh Travel Services. It included my pick up time and location. I stayed in the Old Medina area so my raid wasn’t accessible to anything larger than a motorbike. They did ask me to confirm receipt of the email which I did. It was the smoothest day trip booking experience I’ve had so far.
Getting there
The day of my trip started out a bit frantic because I know all of 4 words of Arabic and about the same in French. You think I’d have bothered to learn “where is” in at least one of the languages, but nope. It was a fail on my part, and I did eventually get to the meeting point. Another problem arose in that there was more than one mini bus waiting to do pick-ups. We managed to work out an understanding of which one I needed to board. After that, we were off to the main meet-up where everyone got sorted into the correct day trip groups. Then we started the real trip which involved driving into the Atlas mountains.
Ouzoud Falls
I can admit that I’m about as obsessed with mountains as I am with large bodies of water. That said it was a pleasant ride with minimal ear popping. I can’t say how long it took because I slept on and off on the way up. Once we arrived, the bus parked, and we met our guide. He accounted for which languages he would need to speak, and we headed up to the top of Ouzoud Falls.
On the way up, our guide pointed out an enormous but incomplete house. He went on to explain that it belonged to the king’s brother. From there we took a moment to pause so everyone could get pictures. Then we moved on to check out the area where the women made argan oil. We learned how they made it and had the chance to purchase some. I didn’t mind this because I needed to restock my supply at home. I honestly wish I’d purchased more.
After our tour of the argan oil production area and a look inside of a Berber home, we got to the fun part. We walked down into the gorge to reach the bottom of the falls. It was pretty much all downhill from there and I’m not talking about the hike (it was a hike NOT a walk). I don’t know how I imagined it would go, but the trail down was a trail in name only. There were a few steps and handrails in certain spots, but it was more rocky, steep, muddy path than anything.
My knees were not okay, but I kept it moving albeit at a slower pace. At that point I hadn’t started sweating, but I was getting thirsty. I got water when we stopped at a little stand, and felt better. We finally made it down to the bottom, where we stopped and took pictures. For the record it was worth the hike down, because Ouzoud Falls looks so much better from the bottom of the gorge. That’s where you feel as if you’ve gotten your money’s worth
See what had happened was…
After all of that, we took the boat ride across the pool that’s filled by the falls. Your other option for crossing was to swim. It was November, no one swam. You could also make use of some sketchy looking bridge like situation. We all paid up and took the boat. Once we got to the other side, I started thinking I was good from there because the path up was paved and had steps. Y’all I was so wrong. I started out okay, but then I started feeling off. Normally, I attribute this to low blood sugar and eat a small snack or a piece of candy.
It wasn’t my blood sugar. It was relatively cool out, so I failed to realize that I was overheating because I still wasn’t sweating. Then came the monkeys. Yes monkeys, they live in the area. Of course these are tourist area monkeys, so they think everyone wants to play with them or feed them. By the time we got to the monkeys I was hanging my head over the rail and trying not upchuck. You may not know this, but that’s a horrible time for a monkey to sneak up and touch you. I may have shrieked, but who knows it all gets sort of crazy from there.
This is one every else starts to freak out because I’m no longer hiding how bad I feel. The guide sends everyone ahead, and comes back to bring me water. I’m extremely embarrassed by this point, but he tells me to slow down because they won’t leave me behind. After that I just had to suck it up and take it easy until I got to the top. The guide made sure to let me know that I wasn’t the first person it’s happened to, but I was the most determined. I was just so happy to be at the top where there was food and a bathroom. I quickly forgot my embarrassment because seriously I wouldn’t be me if something crazy didn’t happen during a trip.
Nightmare material
You would think that nothing more could go wrong, but I assure you Murphy’s law was in full effect. I used the bathroom and sanitized my hands to the gods. On my way out, I opened my anti-theft travel wallet (aka an Altoids tin) to tip the attendant. Then I joined everyone else to grab some food. That’s when I discover my debit card has gone MIA. I freaked out because I had cash, but not enough to last until I went home. Then there was my AmEx, but I didn’t know how useful it would be.
I retraced my steps and even checked the trash cans (zip top bags make excellent gloves in desperate times). No dice, I couldn’t find it. No one else could find it either, so I logged in to my account and turned it off. Maybe 5 minutes later, someone finds it…at the bottom of a trash can that I’d already looked in. We established that someone had it and got nervous when they saw the Black American losing her entire shit. After I smothered it in hand sanitizer, all was well.
An uneventful end
Once we ate, everyone loaded back into the minibus, and we headed back to Marrakesh. On the way we stopped at a little store/restaurant so people could use the restroom and grab snacks if they wanted them. The place had standard toilets and squat toilets. Of course, the line for the standard toilets is insane because we weren’t the only ones who’d stopped there. I was not in the mood to wait, so I hit the squat toilets. The other women looked just this side of mortified, but I had to go. I’d already encountered my first squat toilet, so I was just like eh whatever. That was pretty much the last of the excitement, we made it back to Marrakesh sans incident. They dropped me off where they picked me up, and that was that.
In spite of my inevitable drama, I think Ouzoud Falls is a day trip you should take if you have the time. It’s a trip where you want to be present and in the moment, but you also want to take your camera. Just don’t forget to bring plenty of water and snacks.
Note: I took this trip in 2019—prior to the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. If you decide to travel during the pandemic, please use good judgment and stay safe.
