HelenSince I started training with Helen my life changed completely…
I felt happier once I had set myself a challenge to climb the highest mountain of North Africa in my Dad’s Memory and raise as much money as I could for Cancer Research, plus I realised I had found a really great hobby…
The months passed quickly as I kept training up to the trekking days for Morocco with Helen and the group…every weekend I would really look forward to each new mountain challenge and began to feel fitter and so much more positive about life…
And then the day eventually arrived to fly to Morocco…I felt very excited and at the same time quite apprehensive as I had never walked such a high mountain in my life…
We arrived at the airport and met the other girls that were going to climb with us…it was amazing – all the girls have such a passion for walking and are such strong minded energetic people…I loved them straight away…we all got along so well!
We arrived in the crazy city of Marrakech and were transported to our fantastic Riad in the heart of the old city – the place was alive with sounds of music and drumming in the distance, the snake charmers calls and the magnificent smells of food and spices. The city was hot as we wandered into the famous Jemma el fna medina for our first evening and explored the intricate alleys selling everything you can imagine.
The following morning we travelled up to Imlil from Marrakech in a taxi and then walked a few hours to get a tiny hillside village called Aroumd with sunset views down the valley below and the mountains in the distance …we stayed the night there and talked about what to expect for the next days to come…
Next day very early in the morning we started the climb up to ‘base camp’…it was hot but I kept going as well as I could, and after a few hours we finally got to our refuge where we stayed the night…
My only concern at that point was the altitude sickness and the heat because I didn’t know how it was going to affect me…but so far so good…
The next day again we left really early to climb Toubkal and it was an amazing cold but sunny day…
We started walking really slowly and kept each other’s high spirits and strength every step of the way…when we needed to we would slow down and have a rest and then keep going again…
It was really hard but there were constantly two things on my mind kept me going… the first was the thought that I was going to raise a lot of money to help people with Cancer and second the great adventure of being able to climb such a big mountain with a great group of girls…
At times I felt tired and the thought crossed my mind a couple of times that I wasn’t going to make it…but nothing was going to stop me from achieving my big goal…so I kept going regardless of the cold, tiredness and my aching legs!!
It took us a good few hours to get up there…but once I got up there and saw the amazing views to the Sahara Desert and all the smiles of the girls I thought about my amazing Dad and said a little Prayer for him! I was on the top of the World and it felt so great!!! The journey back down was exhausting but I felt a little lighter knowing what I had achieved and all the hard work had finally paid off…
The next day we also did the other 2 highest peaks of the Atlas Mountains and that was also a great achievement seeing that we were already so tired from Toubkal…but we made it!! What an achievement – the 3 highest mountains in North Africa! The following day we walked back down the valley to Imlil and back to Marrakech for a good celebration and some traditional Moroccan food and entertainment.
For more information on our Trekking Morocco holidays please visit https://www.desperatelyseekingadventure.co.uk/shop/active/morocco-trekking-mount-toubkal/
