Climbing in the Moroccan Anti-Atlas - A Climber's Guidebook

Guidebook includes climbing routes on 25 immense crags on the south side of Morocco's Jebel el Kest, 120km south-east of Agadir, based from Tafroute. The superb rock conditions on the pink quartzite rock provide excellent and adventurous rock climbing routes of up to 500 metres high across all grades.

Good maps of Morocco are difficult to obtain. While the whole of the Atlas and Anti-Atlas have been mapped at 1:100,000 scale (published in 1970),  the detail of names of passes, peaks, contours and spot heights on these maps is often inaccurate. However, they are generally adequate for the purposes of walking. Whether these are, and will be, consistently available to those wanting to visit the country and its mountains is another matter.

Stanfords (website: www.stanfords.co.uk) is likely to stock a set of four copied 1:100,000 maps that covers the Toubkal area – those for the Anti-Atlas are more difficult to locate but it is worth asking. Other sources include the Map Shop (tel: 0800 085 40 80, website: www.themapshop.co.uk), Atlas Maps (tel/fax: 01592 873546 from June to February). Hamish Brown’s Atlas Mountains Information Services may be able to aid you with specific queries (see Appendix A for contact details).

The maps in this guide reflect the area to the south of Jebel el Kest and the Ameln valley (none of the north are available and the descriptions of the area are considered adequate for access purposes). The maps of the Ameln valley are sketch maps taken from a map in the Amandiers hotel and are only intended to give an idea of the area and to help in planning your trip.