The atlas

Stretching over 2,500 kilometers long from west-southwest to east-northeast, from Morocco and Tunisia through northern Algeria and forming a barrier between the Mediterranean Sea and the Sahara, Jebel Toubkal is the highest point of the mountain range at 4167 m altitude in the Moroccan High Atlas. The further east we go. The northernmost of the Atlas mountains of Morocco, it is limited to the north by the Sebou river, separating it from the Rif, and by the Moulouya and Oum Errabiaa to the south. The generally rounded reliefs are separated by fertile plateaus.

Towards the south, the High Atlas is the highest and most rugged of the Atlas mountains. It stretches from the Atlantic coast to the Algerian-Moroccan border. At its south-western end, the massif plunges relatively steeply towards the coastal plain while its northern edge descends more fluidly towards Marrakech. The Ourika Valley is located to the north of the massif. The massif is cut to the south at Ouarzazate by the Drâa valley which constitutes freshwater basins. Being the southernmost of the Atlas mountains, the Anti-Atlas is an old eroded and desert massif on the edge of the Sahara. It forms a transition with the High Atlas, extending east to Jebel Saghro.