Gorges de Taghia, revisited

Taghia village from the top of Taoujdad

As an early fiftieth birthday present to myself I arranged a short trip to the best mountain limestone climbing in Europe. Funny enough, this mythical place is found in Africa, but it is the only limestone climbing the Italian, the Iberians and the French can all agree upon as being possibly the best. This is because of absolutely bomber limestone on orange mountains with most impressive profiles.

Taghia was discovered as a climbing destination in the 70s, when French visitors put up routes following the most obvious features on the biggest objectives, finding traces of one earlier mystery route ascended by possibly a Polish team. In the 80s and 90s the Spanish started to develop the place, among them the Gallego brothers and Toni Arbones, and around 2000 the French found their way back in numbers, when Ravier, Thivel and later Petit and Bodet put in substantial work.

From the turn of the millennium until today there has been rapid development, and the lastest version of Christian Ravier's guidebook (2019) lists 167 long routes from 200 to 900 m around the village, and more than 70 long routes around nearby villages, as well as some 50 single pitch routes. New routes are still getting put up all the time, and soon a single volume will not be enough to cover the routes.

The Guidebook

Despite being in the middle of the High Atlas, Taghia can be accessed within a day from any European metropolitan area. The flight to Marrakesh is followed by about 5 hours in taxi, followed by a one hour hike with donkeys or a short shuttle with a 4x4 taxi, and the one hour time difference to CET makes it easy to leave home anywhere in Europe and climb the next day. 

I assume that the newly constructed route will soon get a better surface and that city taxies can get all the way to the village. When it does, the tourism will absolutely explode as the valley really is one of the more spectacular on earth.

The road to Taghia can be used by cars with good clearance and new suspensions if driving with care 

Compared to last time we visited eight years ago, the village is clearly better off. Now all houses have electricity, the worst shacks have been demolished and better houses have replaced them, and thanks to the road way fewer villagers die in transit to hospital.

There are also more climbers, more hikers, better shops, and it seems like there is better separation between fresh and black water. (We still filtered all drinking water and put chlorine tablets in it, did not eat any fruits that was not peeled, and were served bottled water for dinner.)

The routes are a mixture of fully bolted, mostly bolted, mixed and unbolted multipitch. We did what most casual visitors do and brought just a set of quickdraws with a few alpine draws, a set of wires and a single set of cams from finger to hand. You can easily do without any removable protection for a week or two, but a minimal rack leaves more possibilities to climb long routes where some of the easy pitches don't have many bolts. Next time I will try to convince someone to join me on one of the classic crack climbs and bring a full rack.

From browsing the topos and talking to other climbers on site, I suspect that you really have to be able to climb 6b mandatory to get the most out of a week's stay. The mandatory grade is a rough estimate on how hard you have to pull between the bolts, what the generation of scandinavian climbers before me quoted as the grade they were 'solid' on. 

The routes from the 70s and 80s are of course easier, but they look longer than they look amazing, and might require a few pitons? I suspect they are mostly mystery quests, something that is not everyone's cup of mint tea.

Ravier's beautiful guidebook has clear topos and is generally good, if a bit terse. It must be nice to be able to write for an audience that is thought to be competent enough to tie their own shoelaces. Most routes just have a simple line-drawing indicating the pitches, and a write-up of the name, the length, the first ascensionist details, a word on the rack required—if necessary—and a one-word description. A route is simply 'great', 'beautiful', 'disappointing' or perhaps 'serious'. The approaches are usually described as 'obvious' or in worst case 'useful to scout out beforehand'. In any case, even though the guidebook is in French, you don't need to be able to read French to use it. The drawings are clear enough.

We stayed again in the classic Gite Taoujdad, owned by Said Messaoudi. You can communicate with Said beforehand on email (in French). However, I had to relearn the evergreen lesson of never putting more than one single subject in one or two simple sentences in a mail. (You would think that a teacher would already know this...) The food in Said's gite (breakfast and dinner) was great and plentiful, and shared in the big common room with other teams of climbers, and some occasional hikers — even some Moroccan guests, in a nice international atmosphere. For those of us not speaking Berber or Arab, a modicum of French is more than useful. When we were there there were always people around to help with translation, and it seemed like it was possible to arrange with time for eating breakfast in English as well.

Timrazine, Taoujdad and Oujdad in the morning after snowfall

The weather during our stay was unstable and unseasonably cold, with snow all the way down in the village (1900 masl). Some of the snow stayed on the surrounding peaks for a couple of days. As such we climbed perhaps one or two fewer routes less than I'd have liked. Such is life in the mountains.

Some notes on the routes we did this time: (for more, check out my post on Taghia from our visit in September 2015).

Alex and Mikael on À boire...

Champion de Maroc, 7a+ (Champion of Morocco), ED- 310 m.

Great route on impeccable rock. Listed in the new edition of Parois de Légende. Just next to Au nom de la réforme and À boire ou j'tue l'chien. Pitch 1-5 are fully bolted. To get to the top, bring some gear (either a set of wires or 2-3 friends, e.g. camalot #0.4, #0.5 and #0.75).

Julia on pitch two of Champion de Maroc

P1 7a/+ 30m We scrambled up to the first bolt (3+ friction) and belayed from there, making the pitch closer to 30 than 50 m. The crux is probably a bit morpho. Great climbing.
P2 7a 45m Start up an excellent dihedral to more technical face climbing. Amazing pitch.
P3 6c 45m. More good climbing leads to a comfortable ledge.
P4 5c 40m. Still vertical, but now with jugs. Good fun.
P5 5c/6a 40m. More of the same. Pure sport climbers can rap off after this pitch. We are tainted by traditions and want to go to the top of mountains, so we continued.
P6-7 110m 4+? One bolt. Some gear.

Descent: Walk down the south face, following cairns to find a rap station that takes you down to a saddle. The rap is 35m, but can be done on a 60m rope if you are willing to downclimb a few metres of 4+.

Some of the young men from the village were solicited by the climbing clubs of Casablanca and Rabat for the national championships. The route is dedicated to the local climber Mohamed Amil.

Les Rivières Pourpres, 7b+ (Crimson rivers), ED+, 600 m.

13 draws (11 draws max on the pitches, iirc)

World heritage route. Long and sustained for the first eleven pitches. The 13th pitch is not to be discounted as well. Hauling is easy on P1-11, and might also be possible on P13 (we did not test this theory)

Alex on one of the lower pitches of Les Rivières Pourpres

Approach: Enter the canyon below the north face by an expo 4b move on a polished slab some 10-15 m above the riverbed. Around the corner there are two bolts hopefully equipped with a bit of a rope to use as a handrail. Traverse on the right side of the canyon then cross the river on a juniper tree, then easy climbing to a bolt where an exposed traverse (3c) left leads to easier hiking. A huge boulder blocks the passage, if the water is low you can chimney up a hole on its right side (push the haulbag in front of you), head lamp not necessary. When the river is high, climb the first pitch of Canyon Apache (6a) on the left side of the boulder and rap down above the boulder. After the boulder walk up another fifty metre until a marked path leads up the ledges to the base of the routes. "RP" written at the base of the climb. 1 hour.

Mikael following pitch nine of Rivières Poupres

The approach is regularly swarmed by local kids in flip-flops, so suck it up buttercup.

P1 6c 30m A rough awakening. Challenging and a bit runout. Not that great, imho.
P2 6c 30m More of the same. Some fairly obligatory passages on steep rock.
P3 7a 40m Good pitch. Fairly sustained
P4 7b 25m Steep. I cannot remember a single thing about this pitch.
P5 6c 25m A bit zig-zag.
P6 7a 40m Face climbing to easier terrain (6b)
P7 7a 40m. Technical face climbing then run-out but easier near the belay.
P8 7b 40m. Brilliant pitch. More technical face climbing then sustained climbing through an overhang to a final bit of tricky run-out face climbing.
P9. 7a+ 40m. Great run-out face climbing until the bolter's courage ran out and a traversing A0-style ladder leads to the belay.
P10 7a+ 45m. A steep well protected boulder problem leads to easier climbing.
P11 7b+ 40m. Brilliant steep sustained well bolted climbing to a protected but committing crux. The belay is to the left just below the huge ledge.
P12 5a 55m. Walk across the big ledge, diagonally up a ramp left, then back right past a single bolt to a belay in a horisontal crack.
P13 6b+ 50m. Pretty sparsely bolted crack climbing leads to more complex but still steep terrain. (A friend or two would be nice to have, but who would drag that up this route?)
P14 5a 50m. Some bolts function as cairns to lead the way.
P15 5a 50-60m. Two-three bolts of climbing leads to scrambling. Possible to make a belay around natural features at any point towards the top.

Descent as for Champion de Maroc

Les Rivières Pourpres is a middling crime drama set in the alps. The movie version stars Jean Reno.

Topping out

Soleil de pluie, 6c+ (6b+) ED-, 250 m.

15 draws. 

Brand new route on Parois de Sources. We found this route excellent, but the grade given by the first ascensionist felt a bit off, maybe due to the pristine new rock and no trace of magnesium on the holds. Extraordinary generously bolted. Hauling OK.

P1. 6b+ 35m Start from the newly constructed bridge. Climb with some difficulties past a bulge to a belay. Felt more like 6c, but was not exactly dry and clean.
P2. 6a+ 30m a nice vertical wall leads past a steep ledge to two belays on a steep face. We took the lower belay.
P3. 6c+ 45m. Start up the dihedral and quickly leave it rightwards and up on a brilliant journey. Felt hard for me.
P4. 6c+ 45m. Up the arete and then technical of-vertical face climbing, just to the right of another new route, which it joins at the belay.
P5. 6c 40m. Straight up to a ledge where there is an optional belay where it crosses Rêve d'Aicha. Nice slab climbing leads to a belay on the big ledge system below the fifth pitch of Rêve d'Aicha.
P6. 6a+ 35m. Same as Rêve d'Aicha
P7. 3c 20m. Past a single bolt then up left to a bolted belay, or just make belay wherever. Keep scrambling to the top (grade 2, cairns).

Me on pitch five of Soleil de pluie

Soleil de pluie (Sunshower) is a French variety song from the early 70s.

Baraka, 7b (6b), ED-, 650m

13 draws of which three 60 cm. Three-four friends e.g. camalot #0.4 to #1 for the top pitches. 50 m ropes, light twins would be perfect. We climbed light with shoes and water clipped to the harness and candy in the pockets. Low mandatory grade, but loads of climbing. Long day. Tooks us seven hours to climb, but thanks to rain and snow the days before the route was washed clean of chalk, might be quicker if you can follow some traces of others. The first half had a few wet holds, but thanks to the abrasiveness of the rock it was totally fine to climb in these conditions.

Julia starting up pitch six of Baraka

Approach: From Taghia village, at Gîte d'etape Taoujdad cross the river and take the path leading straight up to Oujdad on the left side of a small hill. The path is well marked and leads to the ledges that crosses the west face of Oujdad.  The route starts after the bridge, at the lowest point of the pillar. The name is written near the base. 1 hour.

P1 6b+ 40m 8 bolts. The start is a bit expo (6a) and I put in a green camalot between the first and second bolt. There is a surprisingly hard section near the belay, bolted for A0. Climb well to the left of the bolts on top.
P2 6b 45m 8 bolts. Mostly slabs.
P3 6b+ 50m 13 bolts. Great slab climbing, watch out for rope drag.
P4 7b 20m 10 bolts. Vertical climbing, bolted for A0 on the hard part. About five-six bolts worth of tricky sustained climbing on slopers with a few crimps.
P5 6b+ 50m 12 bolts. Quite a bit back and forth, use your shoulder-length slings!
P6 6c 40m 11 bolts. Amazing technical face climbing that zig-zags around the bolts. This pitch marks the end of the technical difficulties.
P7 6a+ 50m 8 bolts. The first part of the pitch is harder and has more protection, the second part is fairly easy (5b?) and a bit run-out.
P8 5c 40m 6 bolts. Possible to put in some extra gear if needed.
P9 5c/6a 40m 5 bolts.
P10 5b 40m 3 bolts. Stick to the dihedral, the bolts you see on the right is on Barracuda. Fairly easy climbing between the bolts, possible to add some gear.
P11 6a 35m 5 bolts. A few pulls to leave the belay, then easy hiking on the ridge (3) to the belay.
P12 4a 30m 1 bolt. Hike across the ledge and then up past a bolt to the belay.
P13 6a 35m 4 bolts. Straight up from the belay (solid friend) to a bolt, then join the big dihedral where bolts and solid gear lead to the belay back left.
P14 6a+ 40m 5 bolts. Follow the dihedral on a mixture of bolts and decent friends, and possibly a few mid-sized wires if you are tired by this point. Then slightly left up to the belay.
P15 6b 55m 7 bolts. Straight up (6a) to a well bolted traverse out left and do two pulls (6b) past a bolt to the top. Scramble 30 m. on ledges (2c). Two bolts mark the way to a bolted belay.

Untie and walk up ledges (1c/2a) for 100m to the top of Oujdad.

On pitch six of Baraka

Descent: From the top, descend a well-marked path that meanders on ledges 10-60 m. skier's left of the south-east ridge, with views of Taoujdad. Pass some gendarms and then descend about 100m of altitude until the path branches. The right branch leads to some sheep pasture on a big ledge were cairns and traces leads to a rappel station hidden in a cave behind a dead calcified juniper. The left branch also has cairns and leads to a down-climb (grade 3, unprotected). After the rappel follow a vague path traversing the slope towards south until hitting a well marked path that leads via a big loop south to the refuge at the base of Oujdad. The refuge is manned during the season. From the refuge, the path leads back to the base of the route. 2h30 min to the base of the route.

Baraka is a Moroccan brand of jam. It is apparently also the benediction of The Lord in Islam and Judaism alike. 

Classic routes. I have not done more than half of these, but they are all of good repute and often repeated:

La rêve d'Aicha, TD, 6a+ (6a), 220m. Timrazine (Parois de Sources).
Belle et Bebère, TD+, 6b+ (6a+) 300m. Timrazine (Parois de Sources).
Allumeur du rêve Berbère TD+ 6b+ (6a+) 320m. Timrazine.
Au nom de la Reform, TD+ 6c (6b). Taoujdad. A set of wires if going to the top, otherwise rap the route from top of pitch 7.
À boire ou je tué le chien TD+ 6c (6b+). Taoujdad. A set of wires for the first pitch.
Canyon Apache ED- 6c (6b) 355m. Timrazine
Haben oder Sein TD+ 6b+ (6b risky) 240 m. Parois de la Cascade.
Widi Azry, ED- 7a (6c risky) 500 m. Taoujdad.
Baraka ED- 7b (6b+ A0) 685 m. Oujdad.
Zebda ED+ 7b+ (6c) 260 m. Timrazine (Parois de Sources).
Suserro Berbere ED+ 7b+ (6c) 280 m. Timrazine (Parois de Sources).
Fat Guides ED+ 7b+ (6c) 280 m. Timrazine (Parois de Sources).
Shucran ED4 7c (7a) 380 m. Oujdad.
Les Rivieres Poupres  ED+ 7b+ (6c+) 600 m. Taoujdad.
Fantasia ED4 7c (7a+) 600 m. Tuyat.
L'Axe du Mal ED4 7c+ (7a+) 550 m. Tadrarate.
Rouge Berbère (Astroman of Africa) ED+ 7b 560 m. Tadrarate. Full mountain rack up to camalot #5
Babel ED+ 7c+ (7a+ risky) 800 m. Tuyat.