Le Palais Paysan

Our car slowed to a crawl as a woolly greeting party encircled us, bleated excitedly as cloven hooves skitter on the stone track. This peaceful Berber village hadn't been made aware of our arrival, but a welcome party of their finest sheep showed up to chaperone us through the sleepy cluster of bric-a-brac buildings. Not so much a one-horse town, as a 10-goat town. A sign – probably the newest addition to the village in a century – pointed the way to our final destination, boutique hotel Le Palais Paysan, an architectural wonder with monumental soaring ramparts against a backdrop of blue sky. It seems as though Atlas himself and a few of his giant mates might have hammered the soaring earth walls, work trousers slipping down to expose gargantuan clefts.

Those Game of Thrones location scouts missed an opportunity: the Palais has the sort of neck-cricking grandeur that Daenerys Targaryen would have found rather homey. The soaring gateway is ideal for being borne aloft through while dragons flap about high above, their scales looking striking against the stonework. Unfortunately, we'd left our battle steeds at home, along with our army of Unsullied; instead, Mrs Smith and I meekly trundled our small trolley cases underneath the imposing, angular structure. If there had been an expectant crowd of thousands watching us, awe would not have struck; more likely, there’d be disappointed muttering. 

The Palais may be a bold wonder of earthy modernist design, but it's also very welcoming and comfortable. The main open-plan space is like a medieval banqueting hall, except with more coffee-table books and cushions. There's a fireplace big enough to roast an ox in, but the food we're served is more delicate: artfully arranged plates of fruit and earthenware bowls generously heaped with Berber omelettes for breakfast; rich tagines and chicken pastillas dusted with icing sugar for supper. Our suite was decorated with carved wooden paddles and mirrors made from circular wooden trays, trimmed with feathers as red as the setting sun. The floor-to-ceiling windows open out onto a manicured lawn, and landscaped, tiered gardens dotted with olive and orange trees and punky spiked patches of agave. And there, almost like a painted film backdrop, are the Atlas mountains, a sight we greet with a pinch of surprise every morning – an Expressionist landscape, shrouded in snow and mist, a patchwork of farmers' fields folding out below.

To stay to the Palais is to stay to a Moroccan country estate, to get bucolic and don a metaphorical smock and straw hat. Mrs Smith played at being Marie Antoinette, chasing donkeys in the hotel's model farmyard, before disappearing for a massage, afterwards declaring she’d been marinaded in argan oil and was now going to simmer in the heat. After an inspection of the herb gardens, we're taught how to serve mint tea in authentic Moroccan style: we take careful aim with the ornate teapot and raise it higher and higher above the cup while pouring. 

Later, by the swimming pool, two identical men in white djellabas and red fezzes – a North African incarnation of Tintin's Thomson and Thompson – stood with two keen-eyed falcons on their arms. One threw down the gauntlet to Mrs Smith – well, passed it over politely. A falcon flew to the opposite end of the swimming pool then swooped back, almost skimming the surface of the water, alighted on her glove and claimed a gobbet of rabbit meat. Eager for other new experiences, Mrs Smith announced that it was time to narrow the distance between us and the mountains. ‘Where's your gung-ho spirit?' she asked – It arrived in the form of Said, our driver, who sped us along and along and up and up into the Atlas. We passed small market towns and spiralled higher still, a sheer drop never far away, up past the snow line where we stop for an impromptu snowball fight - just because. We round a corner and arrive at the high plateau, a Lost World of red earth and small cairns of white stones, the sun a lolloping preserved lemon in the sky. We scanned the air for pterodactyls riding on the thermals but heard only the tinkling of bells as a hooved caravan wove into view from somewhere deep in the Middle Ages. Women in brightly coloured headscarves waved at us, eager to hear news of Saladin, perhaps, or the latest from the Mughal Empire. This is the anti-souk: no one will try and sell you a carpet or a sheep's head or an 'honestly, 100 per cent genuine' Beats By Dre pair of headphones here.
 
On the way back to the Palais, we spy a teenage boy idly standing by four small goats as they snuffle around by the side of the road. Suddenly, I glimpse a new life of agrarian quietude – what's the minimum number of goats required for a herd? I wondered aloud to Mrs Smith… Two? Three? I could understand how a herd of 100 might present a challenge when it came to roll call, but how much work would four really be? Our stint at Le Palais Paysan has presented an attractive alternative to our urban-hustle existence. We could start with just a couple, I suggest; call them Mick and Keith, and take turns to pour each other mint tea from a great height.