Walks · Morocco
Real places, told on your phone by someone who was there, as you walk to them.
Free · GPS-guided · works offline · your own pace
59 min · 1.9 km · 6 stops
Told by El Madani El Glaoui
chief of the Glaoua, Grand Vizier
The Glaoui brother who rose with a blizzard, told in his own voice.
Hotel Restaurant Kasbah telouet
Telouet Kasbah
Telouet Kasbah
“I am Si Madani El Glaoui, of the Ait Telouet. My father was qaid here; when he died, and my elder brother after him, the mountain became mine to hold. One winter a Sultan froze in my pass and I carried him down alive, and everything that came to my family…”
Kasbah de TélouetHotel Restaurant Kasbah telouet
This month: Autumn settles cool and clear, the best walking weather of the year. Even a vizier might admit the light suits the painted ceilings well.
When to go: Early morning or after 5pm; at 1,800 m the sun is hard and shade is scarce. The restored kasbah rooms are shown by a keeper, so come in daylight.
Telouet is a scattering of earth and stone in the High Atlas, built around one enormous fact: the Glaoui kasbah, a palace so large that most of it has simply collapsed. What is left standing includes one restored floor of painted, tiled reception rooms, still shown by a keeper for a small fee. Around it sit a village mosque, a small tomb at the edge of the settlement, and open ground looking over the old salt and caravan route through the pass. On foot, at walking pace, the whole thing reads as one story rather than a single ruin — which is what a bus stop by the gate never gives you.
This self-guided audio walk covers that ground in about an hour, 1.9 km, narrated by El Madani El Glaoui, the qaid who once carried a frozen Sultan down through the pass and built a fortune on it. GPS moves the story along as you walk, from the tomb of Sidi Ouisâdan to the kasbah's restored rooms, free to try and downloadable for offline use where signal in the mountains is thin. It suits a traveller breaking the Atlas road journey, a couple with a spare afternoon, or anyone who wants Telouet in one day rather than a fifteen-minute photo stop.
Walk & Tell is a self-guided audio walking-tour app. Walks are free to try; download one for offline before you set out. All cities