Africa & Middle East > Morocco > Northern Morocco > Chefchaouen > Landscape > Articles > Morocco – The Northern Frontier

Legend has it that Hercules once pulled the two continents of the Old World apart at the point where Djebal Tarik (now Gibraltar) and Djebal Musa, the two Pillars of Hercules, lie today. As you stand on the northern pinnacle of Africa on a clear day you are always aware that, although Europe still seems little more than an arm’s reach away, your feet are in an intensely exotic land.

The subtle sweet-and-sour scents of Morocco - spices, olives and the ever present mint tea, ‘whisky Marocain’ – reach you, carried on the soothing arms of the wind they call the Levanter. Funnelling through the Straits of Gibraltar this is the ‘friendly wind’ that keeps the temperature of northern Morocco down to a comfortable average even when the south is sweltering under a furnace blast that seems to have carried straight out of the heart of the Sahara.

A parade of maritime traffic wallows in a westbound swell, as it files in and out of Ceuta port under the evening shadow of Djebal Musa,. Waves that have travelled the length of the Mediterranean form an orderly queue to roll in an inviolable sequence onto the beach that runs in an almost unbroken yellow strand through Restinga Smir, M’diq and Cabo Negro.

At Restinga Smir whole villages of tents bloom under a protecting canopy of pine trees, with local families celebrating the summer holidays or paying homage to the end of Ramadam. Children from the land-locked medina’s of Meknes and Fez splash noisily in the breakers under the jaundiced eyes of a growing numbers of package tourists.

To the south Cabo Negro lies at the southern end of an un-crowded (8km long) stretch of yellow sand. In recent years the advent of a new Club Mediterranean and a 9-hole golf course, butting onto hillsides of tamarisk, heather and juniper have done their utmost to destroy the old-world ambience of this tiny corner of the coast.

Further down the beach the fishing village of Martil provides a better venue to enjoy the atmosphere of the Barbary Coast. Martil has remained an essentially Moroccan fishing village with little concession made for the occasional foreign tourists who come to strut, in uninhibited beach attire, along the glowing sands. Fishing is still a major way of life here and the days are passed in mending nets and preparing boats whilst the nights a given over to the practise of seafaring skills that have changed little since before the pirates ruled this coast.

Although the Barbary Corsairs of Morocco never received the notoriety that was due to their Algerian counterpart Barbarossa, they nevertheless kept up a constant barrage against any infidel ships that were becalmed in the Mediterranean. In 1856 alone they plundered some 80 Spanish ships to the fury of the governor of Melilla who raised a large punitive force against them. The crags and peaks of the Rif Mountains chop into the sky at the back of the village and it is easy to see how the pirates were able to hide their loot and, when necessary, themselves back in the protecting mountains.

Following the Martil Valley up towards the dominating peaks of the Rif you climb quickly towards the magnificent landscape that Paul Bowles wrote about in Their Heads are Green: “big mountains and more big mountains – mountains covered with olive trees, with oak trees, with bushes, and finally with giant cedars.”

Tetouan means ‘open your eyes’ in Berber and, since it was built by Muslim refugees from Granada and Cordoba in 1484, the sight of this dramatically beautiful blanket of snowy architecture, backed by snaggled-toothed ridges has stunned many a new arrival. Even today the architecture betrays an unmistakably Andalucian pedigree with its tiled balconies with delicately wrought ironwork. The medina is a glorious labyrinth of shady squares, with kilometres of mysterious alleys linking bustling zocos. Characteristic odours - like territorial scents - mark the locations of the baker’s souk, the butcher’s souk and the spice souk and help you to find your way through the medina. One of the busiest, Souk El Houts, is devoted to fish in the morning and meat in the afternoon and illustrates Tetouan’s position as a historical trading post between the coastal communities and the Rifian highlands. This city has always been known as ‘the Gateway to the Rif’, in 1913 it was selected as capital of the Spanish Protectorate and it is still regarded as the region’s capital today.

To the town of Chefchaouen, however, lying fifty kilometres south of Tetouan, has been reserved the term ‘jewel of the Rif.’ It is an intensely romantic hill-town, famous for its kilometres of pale blue and whitewashed alleyways. Dark figures in djellaba robes move mysteriously through the labyrinth of the medina and sturdy Rifian women, in red and white striped fouta overskirts and outsized straw hats topped with pom-poms, struggle up the uneven stairways with equally outsized cargoes.

In the winter afternoons the café terraces beside the Kasbah are the domain of old men, talking with their friends or playing chequers and the air is permeated with that, by now instantly recognisable scent, of piping-hot mint tea. But in summer the Kasbah itself is frequently obscured by ranks of tour buses and Chefchaouen absorbs its own underground invasion of lowlife from the backstreets of Fez and Marrakech. At such times the predominant scent in the cafés can seem to be that of cannabis.

Young or old, the café patrons often stop to gaze thoughtfully across the rooftops towards the brutal twin-peaks of Jbel ech-Chaouen. ‘The Two Horns,’ from which the town gets its name, guard the pass to some of the terrace fields on which much of Europe’s cannabis is grown.

Climbing up that rocky trail after a day in the mountains, I had met two men who worked for the Moroccan Ministry of Agriculture, advising local farmers on crops. It was a surreal experience to scramble up, between the terraces of cannabis, whilst they explained to me that the cultivation of cannabis is ‘all but finished in the region.’ Under international pressure, the Moroccan government is diplomatically making moves to stop the export of kif, as cannabis resin is known here. Military patrols and roadblocks are an increasingly common sight in the mountains around Chefchaouen.

Even so for an entire afternoon I walked through the mountains above Chefchaouen and only three times met fellow wayfarers. Once I stopped to let a file of seven Rifian women pass me; they had huge colourfully striped bundles on their heads and didn’t even pause in their ancient market-bound song to acknowledge my presence. Next a young goatherd, who struggled to keep his two wolf-like dogs back from my ankles and then helped me to eat the oranges that I had carried from the medina. Lastly I met an old man leading a tiny Berber donkey. From the saddlebag he proudly unwrapped a block of powdery cannabis resin, as big as a coconut, for my inspection. When I had finally convinced him that I was not a prospective customer, he bid me farewell with a warning, in unmistakable sign-language, about the threatening rain-clouds.

An hour later I cleared a high ridge to be presented with an unforgettable view towards the Oued Lau and across the damper northern slopes of the Rif. The mountains stretched in endless saw-teeth off to the east and west clouds. Then the clouds descended like a curtain and within a moment I could not see as far as the edge of the kif terrace on which I was standing. I had been blessed with that view for only a few minutes but it kept me company through the near-blindness that hindered my progress back to the security of Chefchaouen.

I knew that if I could have seen far enough I would have seen the craggy gorge of Oued Lau with the occasional pools that become popular places of pilgrimage in the hot summer months. If it could be possible to see even further I would have seen the fishing village of Oued Lau, marking the western end of one of the most beautiful and un-visited parts of the Moroccan coast – a 60km chain of deserted beaches and evocative fishing villages stretching eastwards as far as El Jebha.

I knew that if the storm broke behind me on the mountaintop it could very easily cause a flash flood that would rip down the usually dry and rocky bed of the Oued Lau. Along with the thin, precious soil the flood would carry away rocks to lay in the wide, fertile estuary on the lowlands.

Two in five Moroccans are employed in agriculture and it has been estimated that 33% of the country’s farmland is owned by 3% of farmers; the vast majority is left to struggle for subsistence crops in areas where the soil is poor. The country’s land base is deteriorating as a growing population migrates further into marginal areas where heavy rainstorms swiftly carry away the impoverished topsoil.

I was grateful, after working my way cautiously back down the steep slope between ‘the twin-horns’ to make out the form of the sturdy fortress walls of Chefchaouen medina, looming through the mountain mist. The old town, sheltered behind these still seemingly impenetrable walls still maintains the atmosphere of a fortress trading-post of the once infamous Pais Djebala. The Djebala tribe, from whom most off Chefchaouen’s population are descended had a particular tradition of homosexuality and there were ‘boy markets’ here until 1937 when they were officially banned by the Spanish administration.

The Djabala, Like the other tribes of the Rif (all off-shoots of the Kbail, one of the four branches of the Berber) had developed in fanatical and fearless independence. For centuries the Rifian tribes, or kábilas, had fought amongst themselves with such ferocity that a man was often considered a coward if he survived to die in his old age. Then the Spanish troops marched into the town from their strongholds on the northern coast and, for the first time, there was peace between the tribes: Abd al-Karim, the ‘Rebel of the Rif,’ united them in the common aim of obliterating as many Nazrani as possible.

Within six months al-Karim’s Rifian hordes had driven the Spanish back over the mountains with the loss of nearly twenty thousand men. It was only when the rebellion spread southwards from Pais Djabala into French Morocco, in 1926, that the two colonial powers raised a combined force of almost 400,000 to subdue the Rifian tribes.

Towards the southern border of Pais Djebala the oak corks and deciduous forests give way to regimented fields of olive trees around the holy city of Ouezzane. In the 18th Century Ouezzane was one of the principle places of pilgrimage for the Moroccan faithful and today the unique tiled-roof architecture of its medina attracts small numbers of pilgrims from even further afield.

The main highway through the Rif, known as the ‘route of the crests,’ heads east from Chefchaouen through the white market villages of Bab-Taza and Bab-Berret. This is deep kif-country and even where uncultivated that most controversial of plants manages to raise its ‘green head’ over all other competitors. Paradoxically it is just as the road snakes into the cedar forests around Ketama that you arrive in the very epicentre of kif cultivation.

Wherever you go in Morocco after the Rif you quickly realise that the quickest way to find yourself surrounded by the most dubious vendors and psuedo-guides is to once let it be known that you have ever set foot in Ketama. It is difficult to discuss the Rif without discussing cannabis but it has been said that for foreign visitors of any persuasion Ketama is kif.

Although its use is frowned upon, no real effort is made to stop Moroccans from smoking kif but a careless, or too easily trusting, foreigner can quickly find himself on distinctly stony ground. The danger comes most often from the legions of informants who know that there is a quick dirham to be made out of the paranoia of an imprudent backpacker.

The wild, almost Alpine slopes, around Ketama with their tiny hamlets of steep roofed houses are unique in Morocco but the concentration of big-time kif business in the area means that there are risks here too for the unwary traveller. Visitors are often thrilled to be invited to private homesteads to ‘see kif production at first-hand’ or perhaps to partake in the harvest: and some subsequently return with reports of robbery and even violence.

The ‘route of the crests’ curves onwards east of Ketama passing the limestone peak of Djebal Tiderhine, one of the highest points in the Rif at 2448metres. Near Targuist - where Abd al-Karim surrendered to the French forces in 1926 and was sent to die in exile - a minor road plummets down to the sleepy fishing village of Kalah Iris and to what had been described as the most beautiful and unspoilt beach on the Mediterranean coast.

Work has recently begun on a highway that will finally stretch right along this sweeping arc of the ‘Barbary Coast’ to link Tetuoan with the characteristically Spanish resort town of Al Hoceima and onwards to the east. During the holidays Al Hoceima is overloaded with tourists from all over Morocco and Europe but as winter closes in it seems to revert to its old occupation as a marketplace for the products of surrounding Rifian villages.

The wild and windswept headland of Cap de Trois Fourches once gave Pheonicians, Greeks, Romans and Berbers dominion over the coast and since 1497 has been the site of Spanish protectorate of Melilla. Out of the shadow of the Cap the coast continues in an unspoilt chain of quiet beaches – as yet unlinked by the celebrated autopista del Mediterraneo - right up to the Algerian border. Saïdia, the Moroccan ‘last resort,’ is truly a holiday-haven. Very few westerners ever make it out this far along the coast but in summertime the town is invested with a hospitable and festive atmosphere.

Inland, and equally welcoming, is the fertile valley of the Oued Moulouya which forms a pleasant barrier between the last of the windswept Rifian foothills and the Beni-Snassan mountains. These gentle valleys, clad with oranges, almonds and olives, are the perfect culmination to a journey along the Barbary Coast and across the splendid ridges and picturesque villages of the Rif Mountains.

For the western traveller the peaceful sun-blessed slopes of Beni-Snassan, with their terraced vineyards, seem almost to stand as a beatific rebuttal of the fanaticism and tension of Algeria across the border.

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