Today I had planned a run over the Tizi 'n Ticha pass, which is slightly higher than the one we did yesterday but is also a main road and so expected to be busier.
It was, too busy, and so after we had crossed the summit I took a left on the way down to do a loop around Telouet along minor roads - what a good decison this was!
The day started in the low (ish) lands where most of the sights were agricultural, including these bamboo/ reed collection points. Elsewhere we saw these being weaved into very large baskets presumably for donkey's and the like.
Then the road started to ascend as we approached the pass and enterd the High Atlass range.
The higher sections of the road had been undergoing major construction and for about 3 miles up to the summit it was virtually a motorway - and carrying a lot of lorry & coach traffic. I struggled to get photos with no other vehicles in.
The view from the summitt itself was pretty good, lots of twists & turns on the way up of course.
Not long after we got tired of the constant traffic & roadworks and so took the next left down a minor road that I knew headed for Telouet, the site of a crumbling kasbah.
We stopped at an Auberge in Telouet, you can just see the kasbah in the background.
Lunch was berber omolette - basically a spicy omolette cooked in a eathenware tagine - very tasty.
Then we headed over to the kasbah for a quick look around. The kasbah was the 'headquarters' for one of the leading berber tribes and only abandoned in 1956 but already fast crumbling away.
The road then twisted and turned through a dramatic lanscape dotted with small settlements.
Periodically there would be patches of green where water was at or just below the surface and a setllement usually surrounded these.
Some very dramatic buildings in remote locations.
Another view of a settlements around a wadi (a channel that is dry except in the rainy season)
We reached the end of the loop after a very enjoyable ride and turned right back up the southern end of the pass to our B&B for the night. A couple of rooms in a small family home or riad with totally charming owners.
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