10 benefits of the nature walks

Do you like to surf? Or do you enjoy sailing? If you usually practice an active sport such as cycling, mountain biking, or if you enjoy working out whenever you find spare time for yourself… have you ever thought about doing something more relaxing like nature walks? It could be a perfect match for your actual sportive routine, or you could just turn hiking into your main sporty activity. In Forestia we think that surrounding yourself with natural beauty has lots of benefits, and we have a brief list of the best reasons to start doing nature walks:

Continue reading “10 benefits of the nature walks”

Rappenalptal Valley _ Austria

Day 1

We started our hike at the beginning of the Rappenalptal, a gorgeus mountain valley located south of Oberstdorf which is itself the most southern village in Germany. Planned for two days the Mindelheimer Hütte, a mountain cabin high up at the end of the valley and quite near to the Austrian border appeard as a perfekt spot to spend the night.

But first we had the make it there until sunset and so we started our hike in the small town of Birgsau. Soon we entered the forest and made our way up a very steep and rocky path. Altough we had to pay full attention to the difficult but still wonderful trail it didn´t stop us from enjoying the absolutley beautiful surrounding wildlife. After leaving the forest we wandered on a small path surrounded by deep green grass with fields of colourful mountain flowers and high peaks hidden behind some grey clouds. The mood was simply awesome and we forgot about all the ascents difficulties.

We arrived around three hours after starting in Birgsau at Lake Guggesee, just in time for a decent lunch break. We sat ourselves down on a big rock right next to the shore and enjoyed our first delicious Forestia meal really comfortable without bringing extra cookware. While waiting for the meal to simmer a herd of cows stumbled across the corner to enjoy some delicious green and mellow grass. We just finished eating when suddenly heavy rain started to pour down so we hurried up getting our stuff together to continue our hike and not to get completely soaked by the rain. Ironically it stopped raining just at the moment we set off.

Continuously we ascended higher and higher but the trails most difficult part was already over and we enjoyed the following section with destination Mindelheimer Hütte. It turned out as a gorgeous varied path with some wonderful scenic views at the opposite side of the valley and its no less epic mountain range. Meanwhile more and more clouds appeared, the fog began to roll in and even a little rain started to fall down. But the worse the weather went the bigger the smiles in our faces were. We love this kind of weather, especially when were in the mountains.

We reached the Mindelheimer Hütte around 6 p.m. and enjoyed a fabulous dinner after taking an ice-cold shower outdoors with water straight out of the mountain. The rain just stopped after we finished eating so we went outside getting some good shots. Happy, content but really tired we went straight to bed afterwards to be fit enough for the next day’s hike.

The National Park of Peneda-Geres

The National Park of Peneda-Geres is located in the north of Portugal, in the northeast of Minho, extending to Tras-os-Montes. This is a protected area since 1997, considered by UNESCO as a World Biosphere Reserve. It stands out for its scenic beauty, the variety of fauna and flora and for its value of ethnographic traditions.
We left on a Friday following the train rails to Braga and then we boarded a bus to the small village of Campo do Geres. It was about 7 pm when we reached our destination and the sun began to make its way to the moon. We set up the tent, prepared a small meal and went to bed, because in the next day the adventures were waiting for us!
We woke up and early in the morning several birds twittering around us. We prepared the backpacks and started to wandered around a trail that would sum up to about 15 km long. We did a couple of breaks along the way to observe the surroundings, draw and walk . The most important thing was to be there and enjoy the scenery. The dam of the river “Rio Homem” was quite full due to the constant rains that occurred during the Spring this year, so the margins were higher than we would expect. However, we went ahead and through pine woods and gorse fields, we managed to go there and take a peek at the river. Then, we quickly decided to go to the northern shore, at the foothills of the mountain “Serra Amarela”, trying to see the ruins of “Vilarinho-das-Furnas”, a village that in 1972 was submerged by the dam. From times to times, when the water levels lower down, the village emerges, presenting us with a mystical glimpse to the past.

Everything was very green and flourished. We could see many ferns, oak trees, hollies and ivies… Eurasian skylark (Alauda arvensis), tree pipit (Anthus trivialis), dunnock (modularis Prunella) and The European robin (Erithacus rubecula) are some of the birds that accompanied us along the way.

Sólheimasandur _ Iceland

In 1973 a United States Navy DC plane ran out of fuel and crashed on the South coast of Iceland.
Lieutenant Gregory Fletcher, a 26-year-old pilot in training who had only flown 21 hours in a C-117, grabbed the controls of the plane and made a forced landing on the black beach at
Sólheimasandur.

– “I knew we were flying somewhere over Iceland, but I swear that thing looked like the goddamn
moon”, he said.

Fortunately, everyone in that plane survived.

I hate to interrupt at this dramatic point of the story, but there are a couple of things you should know before I continue.

First, is that during the summer months in Iceland there’s something you’ve maybe heard of called “the Midnight Sun”. This means that the daylight hours are endless. Yes sir, there is no night. When midnight arrives, the sun barely deigns to touch the horizon line and stays there like if it were doing some kind of strange dance surrounded by beautiful lights. Only three hours later, resumes its path to the highest, leaving us, poor mortals, with the most beautiful sunrise of our lives.
And this keeps happening over and over again, every day, causing us this need, like an addiction that pushes us to travel only by night. While others sleep, we stay awake and keep driving to not miss a second of this wonderful show.
The second thing you should know is that after midnight, the roads along the coast belong to the fog. It’s just a matter of minutes. A great mass of white mist rushes and assails land like an ancient giant conquering new territories. We were there just to witness it and there was nothing we could do about it. Suddenly, we were surrounded by nothingness in the strangest land.

Serra de Tramuntana, Es Teix, Majorca Spain

Last spring I moved with my partner from Madrid to the beautiful island of Mallorca. We settled unexpectedly in the small village of Deiá, the first place my majorcan love showed me when we  we visited the island together, a long time ago. I immediately felt in love with its pink old stones, the idyllic mediterranean landscape of olives, lemons and oranges trees and its vibrant bohemian ambient. Above all I truly felt impacted by the imposing presence of the rocky mountain standing behind the village, silently facing the mediterranean sea.

Deiá is part of the natural environment of the Sierra of Tramontana, called after the mediterranean cold wind from the North. In fact this rocky rough mountain range runs as a thick backbone from south to north among the island and represents an surprising variation from the flat landscape pattern of the rest of the Mallorca.

The panoramic view of the sea is partially hidden from the village, but you can smell its humidity when the first air of the morning comes in the bedroom windows. You can’t visually spot the sea, unless you walk up the hill reaching the old centre or, as we soon discovered exploring the nature around the village, you climb up to the mountains on its back. From this privileged point of view you can spot all the profile of the northern part of the island, the sea and beyond.

It’s the first time in my life I live literally ten minutes walking from real woods and usually during weekends we just prepare something simple to eat, we take our cameras and we just climb the path from the village to the top of the mountain. This route is part of the so called GR 221 which goes all through the Sierra, connecting every village to another. Most of the trail is based on the network of ancient footpaths restored to make them accessible for hikers of all ages.

The first time we walked from Deiá to Valldemossa, another hidden pearl embedded in these stones, it took about 4 hours to complete the section. Its an easy path, without no particularly climb points. Half the way the road reaches the so called “roof” “Es Teix”, the peaks of the mountain transform itself into an amazing walk between stones and clouds.

This time, tough, we decide to walk just half the way until the the top to have a picnic facing the sea in just a couple of hours without reaching Valldemossa. This way we have the time to come back home before lights goes away, around 5pm. We start directly walking from our home in Es Clot, to the main road which splits the village, the MA-10, and turn at the km 62,9 to take GR 22, direction Valldemossa. It’s 11.30 AM and we can’t wait to arrive for lunchtime.

The first part of the route we climb the street and we still have on our backs the bell tower of Deiá’s old church, as we finally start to glimpse the blue of the sea behind the olive trees. We pass the complex of an elegant hotel, now closed because end of season. After passing a small built-up of farm houses, finally we find the first sign of the route to Valldemossa and we enter in the luxurious mediterranean scrub walking about one hour. After passing through a small portion of land filled with solitary centenarian abandoned olive trees, we enter the woods, made of oaks and pine trees. The air is fresh, all the branches and trunks are  covered with a thin soft cover of green moss. Light gently find its way through the dense crown of trees and we finally spot some shyly mushrooms growing around.