Turkey Tagine & Christmas at the Kasbah (Angour)
It is still September yet, depressingly, the supermarkets are already loading up their shelves with Christmas paraphernalia. An excellent place to escape this shameless commercialism is the snow-capped Atlas Mountains of Morocco with a stay at the luxurious English-owned and run Kasbah Angour (built in the style of a Berber castle).
The weather is warm and sunny during our winter months and the visibility is excellent; ideal conditions for photography and walking and, though the peaks of the mountains at 3000m are covered in snow, Kasbah Angour is at 1000m (well below the snow line) which means you can bask in the warm winter sun in the hotel’s manicured gardens.
Because of its location in the Atlas Mountains, there will be a distinctly Berber feel to Christmas celebrations at Kasbah Angour; though the hotel will have a traditional Christmas tree, there will be no sign of a roast turkey on Christmas Day. In its place the chefs will prepare lunch Berber-style including a turkey tagine and local musicians will entertain guests in the Kasbah’s stone & vaulted café-bar.
Fully licensed, Kasbah Angour offers a good selection of Moroccan fine wines including ‘gris’, which is a cross between a dry white and a rosé – ideal as a pre-Turkey-tagine aperitif, enjoyed on the hotel’s southern terrace.
There are also some great walks on the Kasbah’s door-step with different degrees of difficulty to suit all abilities, ranging from gentle strolls in the valleys either side of the hotel, to more energetic hikes up the nearby lower mountain summits to 1600m.
For those who would like to stay for New Year, on New Year’s Eve the hotel will arrange a reservation in a restaurant on the southern edge of Marrakech for a celebratory dinner (30 minutes’ drive away).
A stay at Kasbah Angour over the Christmas period in an Adrar room (with views of the mountains) costs £75 pp per night (two sharing on a B&B basis. For those who stay 4 nights or more, the rate is reduced to £57 pp per night. A 4 night full board stay costs £335 pp including airport transfers. Upgrades to suites are also an option.
Flights to Marrakech are bookable online with BA, Easyjet, Thomson & Royal Air Maroc.
For more information, visit kasbahangour.com.
Kasbah Angour is owned and managed by an Englishman, Paul Foulsham, who fell in love with Morocco whilst working in the country in the 1980s. In 2004, he realized that there would be a growth of tourism to nearby Marrakech and decided to complement this by offering a mountain experience to the new wave of British travellers keen to discover Morocco. Kasbah Angour took five years to build and opened in 2011
