When you think of mountain biking destinations, what comes to mind?

In Canada, it might be Alberta’s Kananaskis Country, British Columbia’s South Chilcotin Mountains or Quebec’s Mont-Sainte-Anne. In the United States, it could be Utah’s Moab region or in and around North Carolina’s Pisgah National Forest. And if you look farther afield? Like across the Atlantic Ocean and into the spectacular landscape of Morocco?

OK, so no one will blame you if you’re drawing a blank on that one. That’s because despite having superb terrain and trails, Morocco is still considered an off-the-beaten track destination for mountain biking. But Euan Wilson wants to help change that. Wilson is the director of H+I Adventures, an international mountain biking tour company based in Inverness, Scotland, that today announced it would be running three eight-day/seven-night tours to the North African country beginning in May 2019.

Wilson did the on-the-ground prep work for the new tour in May 2018, biking nearly 200 kilometres from Marrakech to the heart of the Atlas Mountains alongside Eric Porter, an American pro mountain bike rider. Here, Wilson talks about that experience and what mountain bikers can expect to see in the country.

Morocco doesn’t seem like a place that most people would associate with mountain biking. How did it become a destination for H+I?

I had been to Morocco a few years ago, although not to ride, and fell in love with it. But the real motivation for this adventure came from a phone conversation I had with Eric Porter one dark winter’s night in Scotland. We’re both fortunate to have ridden in some spectacular locations, but as we chatted, we discovered that neither of us had biked in Morocco and that we were both really keen to get there. I had a vague idea of what I wanted to do when I had the chance to go back to bike, and Eric was up for the adventure, so I mapped out a plan and a route, made contact with an industry friend in Morocco to assist us with logistics and off we went. As far as I am aware, we’re the first people to ride this exact route and piece it all together.