Ourika Travel Guide, Morocco

You can’t expect much greenery in Morocco but here in the Ourika Valley you can see one of the greenest part of the country. It is located on the banks of Ourika River that helps the land be as rich as it is. The green space is like an oasis in summer as it less hot than in the rest of the country.

The region is of superb beauty and life for the people here is not as easy as it may seem. It is very difficult for them to find land that they can work and still they manage to produce the goods necessary for everyday life.

Isolation on the mountain makes people more united and they depend on one another. Trade is done between them and whatever one produces exchanges for what he doesn’t have. The best place to do this is at the Berber market taking place every Monday. It is located at the bottom of the valley and people come from long distances to sell their products and buy whatever they need for a whole week, an old version of the supermarket!

They have depended on one another to survive and they have done a very good job so far. When you visit the remote villages you are astonished by their way of life, it’s like travelling back in time! It’s a paradise you’d like to visit but not quite live in it as you don’t have all the commodities of the urban life.

The poorer you are the more communicative and sociable you are as you rely on the community to survive, while being rich turns you exactly in the opposite person, the richer you are the more intimacy and privacy you want, but in fact you come back from where you left the communion with nature becoming much more important. Rich or poor you long for this connection that is essential to both body and soul to survive.