Ouzoud is the tallest waterfall in Morocco: 110 metres down three tiers of red limestone into an Atlas gorge a few hours from Marrakech. Before any of that water goes over the edge it has already done a day's work. Along the stream above the drop, families from the village of Tanaghmeilt channel the El-Abid into narrow races to turn the grindstones of small flour mills. They have done it for generations, milling wheat and barley for the hamlets around them. The falls are named for that grinding. Olive terraces step down the canyon walls above and below the mills, picked and pressed for oil after the autumn harvest. Their shade is what keeps the gorge cool through the summer. The river runs hardest in spring, from March to May, when snowmelt off the High Atlas swells all three tiers at once.
A stone path switchbacks down through those terraces to the pool at the foot, where you stand with the whole 110 metres coming down above you. Mid-to-late afternoon is the hour for it. Once the sun has dropped into the gorge behind you, the drifting spray throws a rainbow across the water, and the band strengthens as the light angles lower. Small wooden rafts cross the base pool for a few dirhams, and the boatman poles you in under the tallest tier until the falling water fills your whole view and the cold beads on your skin. Up on the higher trail, troops of Barbary macaques move through the trees, mostly unbothered by people walking past. They are rarer than they look: the only primate left in Africa north of the Sahara is down to a few thousand animals across Morocco and Algeria. Below the pool the river threads on through the canyon between boulders and oleander, and the crowds thin within minutes of leaving the falls. The river turns those grindstones first, and going over the cliff is the last thing it does all day.