During our last few days at the Todra Gorge we discovered a perplexing mystery. Three pitches up a climb I noticed a black sheep perched on a pillar across the canyon. From my position it looked like the sheep was stranded, and it was unclear how it could have climbed up there in the first place.
When we returned to town we found Mouhajir, Abdul, and a number of other locals drinking mint tea and chatting. We told them about the sheep and asked if they needed our help to rescue it. They laughed and told us not to worry, that it was “the sacred sheep.” Seeing our puzzled looks they beckoned us to sit down, have some tea, and listen to a story.
Apparently there was a man who lived in a nearby village who was unlucky with animals. Determined to get a good beast, the man bought the best-looking sheep he could find. Pleased with his purchase, he tied it up for the night so that it wouldn’t wander off. When he awoke the next morning it was gone. He searched all over and finally found it had climbed the near vertical cliff and was sitting high up on the pillar.
“The sheep can climb 6a+ (5.10b), free solo,” Mouhajir piped in.
After considerable effort the man got the sheep down and decided he wouldn’t take any more chances: He locked it in a windowless room for the night. But when he awoke the next morning and went looking for his sheep, it had vanished. He ran up the canyon and saw that it had returned to the pillar. Downcast, he realized bad luck had struck again. The sheep must be sacred if it could do this, he rationalized. No mortal should own a sacred sheep, so he left it there to roost.
We left the gorge wondering whether the whole town was in on a joke they played on gullible climbers. We asked around, but everyone told us roughly the same story. Moreover, everyone seemed sincere when they told us their tale. Still, it didn’t make sense to our Western minds that a sheep could survive up on a cliff without water or food, not to mention climb 6a+ to get there. But then again, we’d seen it with our own eyes.
Days later and hundreds of miles away from the Todra Gorge in the Moroccan border town of Tangiers, a friendly stranger struck up a conversation with us. After a few minutes of explaining where we were from, and that we enjoyed our visit to Morocco, he discovered we were climbers and had been in the Todra Gorge. His eyes lit up and he asked us with much enthusiasm, “Did you see the great sacred sheep that could climb cliffs?”
Aaron and I just smiled at each other. Indeed, some things about Morocco would always be lost in translation.

Merrick Schaefer, twenty-eight, has been climbing for twelve years. After two years of living out of his old station wagon, climbing full time, and building the occasional website on rest days, he decided to settle down in Seattle an get a real job ... just not until after that next climbing trip.