Crossing the High Atlas in itself is not so hard. There is a paved road from Marrakesh to Quarzazate that you could do on a pogo stick. But Imilchil wasn't on that road: it was on a minor route across the Atlas, designed, apparently, for trucks or sheep, but I was in a Fiat Uno.

Consensus was a Renault 4 would have been a much better choice. Brilliant, I thought. Renting a Renault 4 would have been cheaper as well.

According to the map the faint brown line that marked the route was 'Piste Generalement Carrossable.' 'Carrossable' wasn't a word I'd met before. I'd assumed it meant crossable, but for all I knew it could be French for 'covered in sand'. Still, I wasn't about to turn back.

Cutting short the debate, I hit the road. Which rapidly ceased to be a road. Forty kilometres hairpinning through the foothills, which had been bad enough on single-lane tarmac. But, where the High Atlas rise suddenly out of Morocco's Atlantic plain, the tarmac stopped and it was back to a track, clinging to the side of a harsh, barren landscape. I inched over rocks and careered through sand-drifts, dropped down and shared the road with a river, steadily climbing.

Light was fading fast when I came to the twin lakes that inspired the Marriage Market. Tisni and Islette are two separatehigh-altitude bodies of water, nestling in the rounded, green-tinged mountains. Legend has it they were formed by the tears of star-crossed lovers.

And so the idea of the marriage market was born. For three days a year the Nomadic tribespeople come together for the mother of all markets. Everything's for sale: old clothes, new tents, second-hand donkeys, herds of goats, and - if you believe the publicity - wives. After that the Berbers disperse back to their mountain grazing sites, beyond the reach of any vehicle.

Imilchil village was a quiet, sleepy place dominated by a mud-built castle, with the high, windowless buildings surrounded by spreading rice-fields. It seemed untouched by the market. One of the two hotels had a Berber tent on the roof and another by the back door. I was not impressed. I hadn't braved death on the mountains for a two-tent annual festival. However I was soon told that the market was for Nomads, and was a good ten miles out of town. It would have to wait till the next day. I settled in to a tagine, a clay slow-cooker for an open fire, then went to my room for a surreptitious whisky.

In the morning our hotelier woke late and crumpled. But even without directions it wasn't hard to find the market. Trucks swarming with people, faces wrapped with long indigo scarves against the dust, threaded along the narrow track that led out of the village. A few regimented rows of tents belonging to Overland companies dotted the purple, undulating plateau. Then we crested the final hill.

Sprawling across the gentle mountain slopes was a forest of tents, stalls, and people. The traffic slowed to a crawl as weinched past a tanker selling jugfulls of petrol, then butcher's tables crawling with flies and dripping blood into the sand.

Groups of giggling girls, wrapped in native blue costume, trailed past stalls selling silver jewellery and glanced shyly at the men. Tents made usually of hide but sometimes plastic held prosperous merchants selling carpets and shoes.

The weddings were taking place in three baroque marquees. Young - and sometimes old - men, dressed in flowing white robes with ornamental silver daggers, were milling around in groups. Gaggled streams of young girls in full traditional dress poured through the men and into the marquees, while groups of parents haggled over the marriage contract. The marriage ceremony itself happened under canvas, and under a barrage of tourist flashguns.

And the cameras were becoming a bit of a problem. The local girls clearly did not like having their photos taken. The Berber men call young girls 'Gazelles' and their dark, oval eyes acquired a hunted look as they pulled their veils close to run the gauntlet of Nikon lenses and broadcast video cameras.

I asked why they didn't like having their photos taken, expecting a quaint and ethnic answer, along the lines of 'they think it steals their souls'. The true reason was far more sophisticated. They were worried their picture would appear in a foreign magazine, captioned as a wife-for-sale. A very real fear.

Although many years ago couples might have met for the first time at the market, these days the marriage happens elsewhere. Only because the authorities bottle-neck marriage licenses for two months before the market are any of the locals persuaded to finally tie the knot officially at the Marriage Market under the massed flashes of the world's press. In fact Berber marriages are far more European than those of their lowland Arab compatriots and they are gradually becoming angry at having their customs misrepresented to the world in the hope of luring an extra trickle of tourists to the high Atlas.

I walked down to the food tents, dispensing tea and flat bread to animated groups of customers, cross-legged on carpets. The atmosphere was free, easy and sociable, and it seemed as though some relationships were still being forged at this annual get-together. My hostess left the cooking to her daughter and settled vastly by my side. After swift preliminaries consisting of asking if I was circumsized, she swiftly proposed.

Quickly I walked over to the transport department. A set of hillocks were crowded with salesmen extolling their vehicles: donkeys, camels, and horses. A test-drive, it seemed, was obligatory and a steady stream of purchasers went wobbling off down the hill perched on the rear haunches of unbroken donkeys. The lucky ones rode back to haggle over the acceleration or handling. To general derision others fell off or ended up leading their mounts back. One wilful camel headed off for the horizon with the vendor in hot pursuit.

Amid all the livestock there was a single motor mechanic, slaving by his teepee over a broken-down car. I noticed with satisfaction that it was a Renault 4.

Long live the Fiat Uno.

Getting There: The marriage market at Imilchil lasts three days in the last weekend of September, but is worth visiting at any time of year. Few hotels or guest houses would rate close to a Michelin star: take a tent or sleep under the desert stars. Check your rented car carefully as there are few recognisable garages and little passing traffic: a four-wheel-drive is safest.

Published in Travel Africa Edition Five: Autumn 1998. Text is subject to Worldwide Copyright (c)