Has anyone done this?

I fancy something different for October / November and have never been to Morocco. Questions for anyone who has been;

Did you take your own bike?

Are the trails similar to southern Spain so probably most enjoyable on a full suss?

How much road / fireroad was there?

Was it worth paying a few £100 more than a trip to Switchbacks etc?

Did you get much time for sightseeing in the local towns?

I’m also interested in other Morocco trips as alternatives to Exodus.

cheers

I went on this Exodus trip with my other half a few years ago now and it was excellent. We hired bikes locally and just enjoyed 6 days of ‘supported’ mountain biking. More physical than technical riding with very comfortable overnight stays. The scenary is stunning and there is time in the evening for a little shopping and sightseeing. The final day is an epic and culminates with a dip in the sea. We booked the flights separately and tagged an extra week on to the trip to visit Marrakech and Fez. Recommended!

Hi,
I haven’t been on the Exodus trip, I went to Morocco with Freeride Morocco, last January though.
To answer your questions:
I’d always take my own bike wherever I went in the world…more so in countries where you struggle to find decent bikes/bike shops. You need to take spares specific to your bike too, pads, mech hanger, maybe a tyre, etc.
A full-sus would be best and yes, the trails were similar to Southern Spain, more epic though.
The trip we did had to take in small roads and fire road because we were biking between our accommodation each day…we never used a vehicle for 5 days, although a van did take our gear between places and meet us to serve our lunch each day.
Having been biking in Spain a few times, Morocco was completely different. It was more like being on an adventure and seeing the different culture, scenery, etc was amazing.
With us travelling across the mountains, we were passing through very small villages, not towns. The sightseeing we were doing was the Atlas Mountains! We ended up in Marrakech at the end, I won’t be in a rush to go back there. A bit of a one trick pony for me and too much hustle and bustle.
If you’ve any questions, drop me an email if you like.

I did this trip during Easter 2008, in fact I met my (now) wife on it. I went with a few mates and there were a few other people on the holiday.

Morocco is a fantastic place to visit and a mountain bike is an amazing way to discover the Atlas Mountains. I’ve also ridden in Southern Spain (Sierra Nevada) with Freeride Spain (Switchback’s next door neighbour, just about) so can make a good comparison.

Unless the trip has changed substantially, and from reading the details recently it seems to be identical, then the riding is virtually 100% on double track, jeep tracks, plus a substantial amount of road. There was virtually no singletrack at all. The 4×4 support follows the whole trip. Don’t get me wrong, the scenery is amazing and you’ll experience the amazing Moroccan back-country on a bike. I really, thoroughly enjoyed the trip, and I’ve ridden XC, DH and everything in between in Moab, California, Spain, all over the Alps etc and lots of other places, but Atlas Descent it is not a singletrack MTB holiday. An experienced mountain biker would probably feel short-changed from a riding perspective if they went expecting singletrack.

Having said that, Exodus know how to look after you, and if you want comfortable hotels, beer every night, lots of amazing scenery and good food, along with what I would call MTB touring, without having to think about a thing, then it’s a great trip, and a brilliant country to visit.

There were several novice mountain bikers on our trip, on hired hardtails with V brakes and they were just fine. I took my Heckler and was completely over-biked. A short travel XC full-suss would probably hit the spot, a hardtail would be fine too.

One other thing to note, Exodus sell this holiday as Atlas Descent, and it’s true that every day has more descending than climbing, but there are some significant climbs, often on road, including one 10K climb all on tarmac road, and a 15K descent all on tarmac road.

I researched Flow MTB’s trip to Morocco recently and it sounded much more like a Mountain Biker’s trip, with much more of a singletrack focus, so maybe get in touch with them.

I took my own bike, as did six others. We flew with Royal Air Maroc and had no problems at all (two leg flight, LHR to Casablanca, Casa to Agadir). There was some time to sight-see in the towns after riding and that’s a must-do.

I don’t think you can compare Atlas Descent to a Spain trip with Switchbacks. Sierra Nevada is long, steep, tech, rocky, singletrack downhill. Atlas Descent is MTB touring on jeep tracks, uphill and downhill.

Really good trip though, as I said, I met my wife on that trip, I can’t guarantee you’ll meet yours, unless she goes with you of course.

I went on the ‘High Atlas Descent’ tour about 5yrs ago. It was fabulous cycling through the parts of Morocco that you wouldn’t see on a traditional tourist trip.

The tour itself was superbly supported, and the hotels we stayed in were lovely. I’d still like to know exactly what was happening to that donkey in the walled town we stayed in though!

It was cycling, rather than mountain biking though, if you get what I mean. The trip was pretty much 100% dirt tracks with the odd wee bit of tarmac thrown in. Still fabulous though!

One of the wee oasis villages

Last day, with the surf in the distance!

Hi,

I went on this trip about 5 years ago. Took my own bike, it was FS, but to be fair wasn’t really needed. The bikes they used for hire were HT Spesh’s. However it was nice to have my own bike for comfort and a bit of extra speed. They maintained their own bikes, but not yours, not a problem for us as we were a large group and had brought a range of spares (including tyre, saddle, peddles) etc with us.

As Santacruz says it was more about the trip that the actual trails. The support was great with local guides helping, driving support and providing lunch, just one UK guide leading. All except one short climb was designed to allow the support vehicles to follow us – so virtually no single track. However some slightly rocky tracks and a river bed made it interesting. You are in very remote areas and I would guess that rescue if you had a serious crash would be slow, so maybe not a bad thing that it was so track based.

There were some vehicle transfer sections during the week, but they were shortish.

The things I enjoyed were the fact that you got to sightsee true Moroccan villages and life, way off the tarmac road that restricts most tourists. The scenery was superb, comfy evenings, good food.

Not so much time for sightseeing, I think we had a couple of hours in the local market, tea in a carpet shop and some time at the start / end in Marrakech but some nights were in remote places so not always available.

The ‘downs’ were the lack of technical riding (although the blast down to the sea on the last day was a hoot) and maybe being tied always to the slowest in the group – although to be fair we wanted a relaxing holiday anyway, so it didn’t really cause any issue.

EDIT – The last three reports were from the same trip – so guess we enjoyed it. Come on allthegear – where are you?

The trip I did looks/sounds very different to the Exodus one. There were plenty of singletrack descents, but I suppose that goes with crossing a mountain range. It involved us staying in gites in the villages along the way. There were no comfy hotels along the route! We only stayed in a hotel once we got to Marrakech.

Dan – your photos make me wanna book a trip for the new year!!

Thanks guys, that’s sort of what I thought. I spent 6 weeks riding “proper” mtb trails in Europe and living in a van this summer, so the idea of a well supported mtb tour isnt all bad. But it’s good to know in advance. I did some riding in Turkey with Exodus 10 yrs ago which sounded similar, and was my introduction to mountain biking.

I’d love to go to Morocco, but it doesnt have to be on a bike. The Atlas mountains in winter sound very interesting.

I will look at the more technical trips though, they’re also cheaper.

Get it booked Jon!

agentdagnamit – The Atlas mountains in winter sound very interesting.

It depends on what you mean by ‘interesting’…on our first day, we ended up above the snow line and were lucky the snow wasn’t any deeper than what it was.
At night when staying high up, the temperatures were way below freezing. I think my sleeping bag’s comfort rating is -8degC and I still had to wear thermals!
We were also very lucky with the weather. The week before there had been blizzards and rain. We only got a bit of rain on one afternoon.

The Cycleactive trip in the same area is far more technical/singletrack than the Exodus equivalent. We rode with Cycleactive there maybe 3 years ago and had an epic time (and compared itineraries, pics and stories with mates who went with Exodus around the same time), and chose Cycleactive over Exodus after a lot of research. We can’t recommend the trip or Cycleactive highly enough. With them its a mixture of the trip AND the trails.

Brilliant place to ride, everything from red slickrock to alpine rocky singletrack and moon scapes. Usually within an hour of each other..

wobbly aquaduct crossing over 100ft deep gorge. Possibly not part of the official itinerary…

crashtestmonkey – Was it a requirement to wear those pads? Soft-shelled knee pads maybe, but full on, hard-shell DH pads?!?

I think we did that wonky gorge crossing. We went back in 2007 with Simon from Bike Exodus (I think) on his last trip. I had a mostly busted shoulder which didn’t help but an amazing place.

CIMG0804 by jdnash_mtb, on Flickr

CIMG0798 by jdnash_mtb, on Flickr

CIMG0806 by jdnash_mtb, on Flickr

IMG_1297 by
Alex Leigh, on Flickr

IMG_1255 by Alex Leigh, on Flickr

I’d go again. In fact looking at this thread, I think I might have to sort something out!

Cant see pics at work, so I’ll have to check later.

Small question….is it a dry holiday, ie no booze?

There was nowhere to get alcohol in the mountains, you can buy it in certain supermarkets and hotels though. The best bet would be to take it with you. Maybe buying it in the UK duty free?

We found a bar in Marrakesh 🙂

CIMG0701 by jdnash_mtb, on Flickr

Also stayed at a few places in the mountains where – after Tangine – the locals would invite us to try their home-still-made aperitifs 😉 Fairly sure I went blind at least once.

Can anyone recommend a place to hire at least reasonable bikes in Morocco (Marrakech or Quarzazate ideally)?

I’m going to be over there in Oct and the photos above have convinced me I need to do a little two wheeled explorationing of the Atlas once back from the desert.

d45yth, no requirement, most of us were just old enough to have stopped bouncing when we fall! Our group was me n Munqe Chick celebrating her 30th, and a bunch of guys in their late 40s who had all met thru a previous employer (oil industry) and met up each year for a ride holiday despite being spread across the globe.

The guy behind Munqe Chick in a few of the shots is Rich their guide, often giving MC some impromptu skills tutoring.

Agent, our local guides managed to source beer at every overnight stop…

Alex, cracking pics!

Have spent some happy time googling this afternoon looking at ways to go back. Was a fantastic trip but with a bggered shoulder couldn’t ride as much as I wanted. Need t go back and put that right