Michlifen
A ski station set inside a volcanic crater in Morocco's Middle Atlas, whose original drag lift has been out of service since 2005 and dismantled; lift-served skiing moved to a separate slope a few kilometres away.
- Region
- Ifrane Province
- Country
- Morocco
- Status
- abandoned
- Year opened
- 1950s
- Year closed
- 2005 (crater ski lift)
- Reason for closure
- The small drag lift in the Michlifen crater stopped running in 2005 and was subsequently dismantled. Lift-served skiing in the area transferred to the Jbel Habri slope about 5 km away, leaving the historic crater bowl without mechanical uplift.
History
Michlifen sits in the crater of an extinct volcano in the Middle Atlas, near Ifrane in a region marketed as Morocco's Little Switzerland, ringed by Atlas cedar forest. The peak reaches 2,036 m and the ski terrain runs between roughly 1,800 m and 2,000 m. A small station was built here in the 1950s and it became the country's second winter sports destination after Oukaimeden, with snow lying from about mid-November to the end of March in good years. The drag lift in the crater itself has not operated since 2005 and has been taken down; what lift-served skiing remains in the area is on the Jbel Habri slope roughly 5 km away, between about 1,880 m and 2,060 m, with two lifts and around a kilometre of easy and intermediate piste. The crater bowl is still skied and walked but without uplift. Documentation is poor: the French Wikipedia entry is a flagged stub, and no source found records the lift's specification, its builder or the exact date the station opened.
Lifts
| Name | Type | Manufacturer | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Unnamed lift | Surface lift | A small drag lift in the Michlifen crater, out of operation since 2005 and since dismantled. Its length, manufacturer and installation date are not documented in any source found |
Sources and further reading
More in Morocco
Location
33.4158, -5.0833