Following the establishment of Michlifen ski and mountain resort in Ifrane province, which we covered in an article published here on January 23, 2005, the Oukaimeden area in El Haouz province of the High Atlas, according to the "Moroccan Mountains" magazine edited by the CAF in Casablanca, attracted mountain enthusiasts since the advent of skiing in Morocco in the 1930s, despite the previously difficult access when it took 6 to 7 hours on mule back from Asni to reach the plateau as soon as the first snows fell.
According to the same source, the Marrakech section of the French Alpine Club built a modest refuge in Oukaimeden in 1936, which nonetheless allowed for more regular visits to the site and the organization of the first ski courses. In 1938, a military center was established, and in 1941, a more spacious chalet was set up by the French Alpine Club. The Moroccan ski championships were held for the first time in Oukaimeden in February 1942.
In 1948, the first drivable road connecting Marrakech to Oukaimeden via Tahannaoute and Sidi Fares was opened and, five years later (around 1953), two hotels and about thirty private chalets were built in Oukaimeden, with traffic routes as well as water and electricity supplies being set up, and the first two ski lifts—the Chouka (1100m long with a vertical drop of 380m) and the "medium" lift (297m long with a vertical drop of 78m)—were installed at the resort, which also added two ski jumping ramps.
In 1963, Oukaimeden resort was equipped with a chairlift 1960m in length with a vertical drop of 620m and a capacity of 600 skiers/hour, a new ski lift, and connection to the national electricity grid, which encouraged the resumption of building construction and tourist visits.
In 1965, a new access road through the Ourika Valley was opened, making it easy to reach Oukaimeden, which was equipped with two additional ski lifts in 1967 and connected to the automatic telephone network in 1970. Finally, in 1992, the summit of Oukaimeden was developed with the installation of a ski lift for the summit gully, a viewing platform, and a chalet-restaurant.
In the early thirties, the High-Atlas section of the French Alpine Club was established near the site of Oukaimeden in Marrakech, and it was not until the 1941-42 season that the Casablanca section of the French Alpine Club was established. Following this, a ski league of the French Ski Federation (FFS) was established in Morocco to coordinate and organize the activities of all these clubs and others that emerged after 1942, thus contributing to the promotion of winter sports in Morocco since the thirties.
The skiing area at Oukaimeden resort currently spans about 300 hectares on the northern slope of Mount Oukaimeden, ranging from 2620 to 3270 m in altitude.
During moderately snowy years, this ski area can be used from mid-December to the end of March, a period of about one hundred days. Given its relatively modest maximum altitude for its latitude (31°), the ski area at Oukaimeden resort cannot guarantee high-quality snow conditions throughout this period, which hampers its marketing, especially abroad.
Moreover, our source points out, the overly challenging technical difficulty of the site represents a disadvantage: indeed, 75% of Oukaimeden's ski slopes are suited to good skiers and only 25% to intermediate or beginner skiers, whereas ideally, these proportions should be reversed.