Azrou

Azrou means rock in Tamazight and refers to the black basalt outcrop the town is built around, and it is the Amazigh market town of the Middle Atlas - a working place of green-tiled roofs, a Tuesday souk that brings the surrounding villages in with livestock and wool, and a long-established artisan cooperative producing cedar carving, since the wood is at the door. The forest above the town is the reason most travellers stop: the Cedre Gouraud stand and the roads towards Ifrane carry Atlas cedar in depth and the Barbary macaques that live along them. Azrou also has the Collège Berbère, established under the protectorate as a school for the sons of Amazigh notables and now a lycée. The town is unpolished, cool at 1,250 metres, and the base for the cedar country.

History

The name comes from the large rock outcrop in the centre of the town, aẓro meaning "rock" or "stone" in Tamazight, and the town's first known mention is in a letter from Fernão Taveira to King Manuel I of Portugal. In 1952 twenty Benedictine monks founded the monastery of Toumliline nearby, which hosted meetings between Christians, Jews and Muslims from 1955 to 1964 (Wikipedia, Azrou).

Highlights

• The black rock - the basalt outcrop that names the town.
• A Tuesday souk - livestock and wool brought in from the surrounding villages.
• Cedar carving - an artisan cooperative working the wood from the forest above.
• The forest at the door - Atlas cedar and macaques on the roads towards Ifrane.

When to go

Spring and autumn; Tuesday for the souk; winter for snow in the cedars. A day.

Practical notes

The town itself is workaday rather than picturesque - the forest is the draw. Do not feed macaques; roadside vendors sell nuts for exactly that and it harms them. Winter snow can close the mountain roads. Accommodation is basic.

Nearby

Ifrane is north-east; the Cedre Gouraud and the cedar forest are above the town.

Key facts