Fez to Marrakech via Ouzoud Waterfalls | 2-Day Tour | Cedar Forests — Barbary Apes — Morocco's Most Beautiful Waterfall

Most travellers make the journey between Fez and Marrakech in a straight line. The smarter approach takes two days and detours through some of the most rewarding landscapes Morocco has to offer. This two-day private tour threads south through the Middle Atlas — alpine towns, cedar forests thick with Barbary macaques, the ancient Kasbah of Beni Mellal — before arriving at the Ouzoud Waterfalls, where Morocco's tallest cascade drops 100 metres into an emerald gorge.

A night beside the falls, a morning walk, a visit to the extraordinary Imi n'Ifri natural arch and the potters' village of Demnate — and then Marrakech, arriving refreshed and with a handful of experiences that the overnight train simply cannot offer.

Highlights

• Drive through Ifrane — Morocco's improbably alpine 'Swiss city' — and the cedar forests of Azrou, where wild Barbary macaques descend to investigate passing visitors
• Visit the Kasbah Ain Asserdoun at Beni Mellal: a historic fortress set above a natural spring, its garden terraces overlooking the Tadla plain
• Arrive at the Ouzoud Waterfalls — the highest in Morocco at over 100 metres — and explore the winding trail network to the emerald pools below with a local mountain guide
• Spot resident Barbary macaques along the gorge trails and look out for the rainbow that often forms in the waterfall's mist on sunny afternoons
• Explore the Imi n'Ifri natural bridge — a 30-metre geological arch carved by an underground river, unique in Morocco and teeming with cliff-nesting birds
• Wander the artisan lanes of Demnate, a charming village famed for its traditional pottery workshops and its unhurried, authentically local atmosphere

Leave Fez at 8:30am and the city quickly gives way to the broad upland plateau of the Middle Atlas — a landscape of volcanic lakes, cedar forests and clean mountain air that feels worlds away from the medina you woke up in. The first stop is Ifrane, one of Morocco's most unexpected towns: founded by the French in the 1930s as a colonial hill station, its neat chalet-lined streets, manicured parks and famous stone lion make it feel more like a Swiss ski resort than a North African city. It is genuinely charming and a popular picnic spot for Moroccan families, especially in summer when temperatures on the plains drive people uphill.

From Ifrane the road climbs into the cedar forests above Azrou, where a resident colony of Barbary macaques has made something of a local celebrity of itself. These are wild animals — inquisitive, photogenic and entirely at ease with visitors — and the moment a troop of them emerges from the cedar canopy above the road is a reliable highlight of the day, particularly for younger travellers. The drive continues south to Beni Mellal for a visit to the Kasbah Ain Asserdoun, a hilltop fortress above a natural spring whose garden terraces offer sweeping views across the Tadla plain, before the road climbs towards the edge of the Ouzoud plateau and Morocco's most spectacular natural attraction reveals itself.

At over 100 metres, the Ouzoud Waterfalls are the highest in Morocco — three tiers of white water plunging into a jade-green pool framed by ancient olive trees, with the resident Barbary apes picking their way along the cliff edges and a rainbow shimmering in the spray on clear afternoons. After lunch at a riverside restaurant, your local guide leads you down through the olive grove on the winding trail to the pools at the base of the falls, where the mist settles on your skin and the sound of falling water fills the gorge.

Day two begins with a morning walk if time allows, followed by the short drive to Demnate and the Imi n'Ifri natural bridge: a 30-metre limestone arch carved over millennia by an underground river, its walls home to dozens of cliff-nesting bird species and its shadowed interior a cool, otherworldly space. Marrakech follows in the early evening, and the journey feels complete.