La route est coupée or ACrackingOverTheTopDrive
Trip Start
Jan 28, 2011
1
15
Trip End
Feb 26, 2011
Askaoun, Souss-Massa-Drâa, Morocco
Monday, February 21, 2011
The views got increasingly better as we drove into the country. At first, the land became green and lush, with farmers working their big fields. As we drove further in, and came to higher altitudes, the land turned rockier and more of the hills had to be terraced. With the altitude also came more stunning views of the landscape, overlooking hills and valleys, with a big mountain range in the distant. The road passed small villages, were the inhabitants came out and greeted us as we drove passed.
Our road took us up winding serpentine roads, and drives along precipitous mountain sides. And the pace kept just high enough to get a nervous tingling the stomach. When the darkness surrounded us, we found ourselves in a small quarry, just south of Tafroute, where we set up camp. Expecting a cold night in the mountains, we got out all the blankets to fend off the cold.
The successful previous day compelled us to keep driving through the Atlas mountain range, forgoing some cities and regions we had planned to visit. It seemed like the prudent thing to do considering the security situation in the region.
The road took us by numerous oasis and green terraced farmland, across the beautiful mountain landscape. It was a leisurely drive up until reaching the village of Askaoun late that afternoon. We had problems making out the road, so we asked directions from the people on the street as usual. The answer was anything like usual though: “La route est coupée”. The road is blocked. After a more detailed inquiry it turned out that the road wasn't open yet for the season, but could be passable, but otherwise the owner of the tavern would have rooms ready for us when we came back.
We obviously chose to try the road at least, not surrendering without a fight. The road had obviously taken some damage by water and had big parts washed away, forcing even our 4x4s to drive carefully. It wasn't long before the road was cut off entirely, not deeper though than it was possible for us to drive straight across, with the towbars just making contact. The next one wasn't so easy, but forced us to look up alternate routes, driving off the road to get closer to the stream still flowing with water and cross from there.
It was curious how the difficulties increased for every obstacle we encountered. Soon we reached a new type of impasse, a several meter deep trench, where even the groundwork for the road had washed away. Not finding an obvious way to get around we had to go out a scout for options. Finding a good solution we soon moved all the cars pass the obstacle and continued on. Seemingly the dirt was to easy, so now the obstacles turned to rocks, reducing our options drastically. Unlike the previous obstacles these went on for quite some way, dramatically increasing the time needed to traverse them. We had to resort to building the road with rocks to get us passed the worst sections.
It got dark as we passed the second rocky section and we decided to set up camp for the night, before continuing on. We were some 200 meters below the altitude of the Tizi-n-Melloul pass, which we were heading for, with no real sense of how far that was along the ground.
Waking up freezing we started making some sort of breakfast before setting off. Among our food we found some white paste we couldn't identify, until we realized that it was our cooking oil that had frozen in the cold surroundings. Along the last section the previous night we had passed small patches of snow that we found amusing. That feeling would not remain for long.
We worked our way passed similar obstacles as the day before with the addition of driving down steep slopes to get around washed away road sections. At one instance it was so steep and rocky that we hesitated, worried about damaging our cars in trying. Finally, we agreed to build up the road a bit before making an attempt. Very soon a man turned up, the first person we'd seen that day, and started helping us build a ramp down the slope. Being very careful and meticulous building the ramp, the actual drive was uneventful.
It was closing in on midday when we encountered a new type of obstacle, snow. Getting higher up there was still a lot of snow flowing down the mountain sides. With the deep snow and a good drop-off to the side, we became forced to dig out the road to safely pass. With the shovels we brought, intent to dig sand, we started clearing the snow off the road. It didn't take to long until we could pass this obstacle, but we could see that we would have to repeat it several times before getting off the mountain range.
We managed to pass a few without having to clear them of snow, but soon we encountered a long stretch of snow covered road. First looking for alternatives to digging, we soon had to resort to the shovels again. Soon after starting digging, a man came up to us, clearly from the village in the valley below. With him he had a shovel and without a word he started hewing into the show, helping us clear the road. Within the hour, we had managed to get our caravan passed the obstacle.
Clearly getting worn down by the long sustained effort, we seriously discussed if we would push forward when we faced another section blocked by snow, this time with even more. It was decided that send scouts ahead to asses the nearest kilometers before putting in the effort. Meanwhile we used binoculars to judge the general passibility of the area. When both teams could give a thumbs up, we rolled up our sleeves. An hour later when a path had been cleared we all felt relief, but also a bit of worry. It turned out to be well founded. The cars just sank into the snow when driving across. The warm day melted the snow, making it to weak to carry our heavy cars. We packed in more snow, re-enforcing the tracks with rocks. With some effort we got through the first car, but when the second one came along, the snow had been undermined and gave way, sliding one of the wheels outside the road. Stopping almost in panic, we had to find a solution for this dangerous situation. Slowly and painfully we built up the road under the wheel after we had lifted it with a high-jack. Relying on Anthon and Steve's experience with this more extreme kind of situations, we rocked the car after making the changes to the ground, hoping for it to jump back into the correct track. As it started to move, we all jumped to the outside, pushing it for all we were worth back into safety. The attempt proved successful and we soon got the car over. The final car had to be towed across most of the section, as the snow had given way all the way.
Just after we reached the Tizi-n-Melloul pass at 2520 meters. From there it was a trivial drive down the other side, with us powering through the obstacles we faced. We all thought about how close we were to turning around when the end was so near. Driving between herds of sheep and lamb, we savoured the drive all the way down to Anezal. There we got our first cooked meal for several days and took in to a hotel for the first time for the entire trip. Here we finally parted ways with our English friends.
