Rebild Hills and Rold Forest

Rebild Bakker is a stretch of open heather hills held in public ownership since 1912, pressed up against Rold Skov, one of the largest forest tracts in Denmark. The two together make an unusually varied walk for this country: pale heath and juniper on the slopes, then dense beech and spruce, then the Gravlev valley below with some of Denmark's strongest karst springs, including Store Blakilde, whose sandy floor turns over visibly as the water wells up. Paths run from the car park at Rebild down into the valley and on into the forest, where old limestone workings honeycomb the hillside. In August the heather turns the slopes purple.

What you actually see

• The heather slopes - open hills that colour deep purple through August.
• Rold Skov - beech and conifer forest with old gnarled trees and quiet tracks.
• Store Blakilde - a karst spring that boils up visibly in the Gravlev valley.
• Thingbaek limestone mines - worked chalk galleries in the hillside, now used to show sculpture.

When to go

August for the heather, May and June for beech leaf and birdsong, October for colour in Rold Skov. The Rebild bowl hosts a large Danish-American gathering each Fourth of July, which fills the car parks for a day. Winter walking is fine, though the valley paths turn muddy.

Honest expectations

It is a walking destination and little else, so bad weather leaves you with nothing to fall back on. The hills look gentle, but the drop into the Gravlev valley and the climb back out is real work by Danish standards. Car parks near Rebild fill on summer weekends, and long stretches of forest track look much the same.

Nearby

Aalborg is half an hour north; Lille Vildmose lies east towards the Kattegat coast.