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Morocco:
West Atlas Bicycle Africa / Ibike Tours |
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Western Atlas:
Oum Er-Rbia RiverTowns: Oued Ifran, M’Rirt, Khenifra, Ben Khlil, Zaouiat Cheikh, Kasbah Tadla, Beni Mellal, Oued Ayad, Tassaout, El Kelaa des Sraghna |
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| From Azrou to Khenifa is long sections of gentle descents, interrupted by a couple of small ridge to cross. The is plenty of visual interest along the way, from a variety of farmhouse and crop, storks with chicks, cattle and green houses. | |||
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| The first to frames about show beehives. Between Azrou and Beni Mellah, there are easily a hundred farms with signs saying honey for sale. Many of these are also paired with olive presses, so farms with olive trees, but now press, can bring their crop in and have the oil presses out. The far right frame shows a protective structure over some fruit trees. | |||
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| The two center frames are of the road leading into a ravine and the totally different vegetation along the watercourse in the ravine. For the right frame, as the elevation drops, olive orchards reemerge in the agricultural mix. | |||
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| Along the route, micro-climates or micro-ecologies are interesting; elevation change, the steepness of a slope, the direction of exposure, and factors not determined, seem to influence the local vegetation. Between M'rirt and Khenifa, the view goes from flat wheat country to a steep, heavily wooded hillside in a couple hundred meters. It is all beautiful. | |||
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Khenifra has piece of the Moyen Atlas mountains on all sides and straddles the
Oum Er-Rbia River, "the mother of springtime". The Oum Er-Rbia
River forms in the Moyen Atlas, 60km northeast of Khenifra and flows to the Atlantic Ocean
250km to the west,
at Azemmour. But the river is 555km long. Khenifra is the self-proclaimed "Capital of the Middle Atlas". It has all of the amenities of a large town. |
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| Out of Khenifra, until Zaouiat Cheikh, the highway winds around and over hills of the Atlas foothills, and dropping in and out of river cuts. For reason we can't explain there is a pagoda on the roof of a building in Ben Khlil. | |||
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| While in other areas, there were large combines for harvesting the wheat, in this area a lot of the work was being done by hand. A view of the general landscape shows much small farm size, and more diversity in the agriculture. There must be some farm equipment in the area, because there is bailed hay curing around some olive trees. | |||
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| Barrage El-Hansali Reservoir, on the Oum Er-Rbia River, spreads like a large dendrite, into valleys, for several kilometers, along the road between Ben Khlil and Zaouiat Cheikh. | |||
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| After Zaouiat Cheikh the country side flatten out, the farm size expands exponentially and large farm equipment comes back into play. The scenery, colors, textures and topography are ever changing and ever beautiful. | |||
  The center of Kasbah Tadla in on the Oum Er-Rbia River, a
kilometer away from the Khenifra-Beni Mellah road. The Tadla, in Amazigh, mean
bouquet of wheat. Above the town, near the highway, is a monument consisting, in
the simplest description, of four square tapered pillars. Le Monument
Commémoratif des 4 Colonnes (Commemorative Monument of 4 Columns) dates to
at least 1933, no other information can be found. |
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 Look
one way on a street in Beni
Mellal and you will see the foot of Jbel Tassemit. In the other direction are
the plains of Beni Amir.Beni Mellal's weekly market could pass for a weekly market in sub-Saharan Africa. The food section is extensive, with multiple vendors selling a wide variety of fruits and vegetable, and there are plenty of grains, bean, peas, nuts and seeds. There was also the live chicken woman, and just outside, the fresh egg man. Elsewhere in the market there was almost every clothing item, tool, house ware, and spare part imaginable. |
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| The plains of Beni Amir are impressively productive. Everything from corn, fruit trees, vegetables, figs, grapes and oranges is grown with irrigation. the source of the water is presumable artesian wells, because there are now large reservoirs in the area. Most of the watering is done by very efficient drip irrigations. | |||
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| Not far after Ouled Ayad and the limits of the irrigation, the landscape changes radical in a very short distance. Grain, as reflected in the grain elevators and olive trees dominates the remaining distance to Marakech. | |||
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