Water group discovered the reeds yesterday.

The Water group went on their first real field trip. We tried to access water, and the only place we could get to it was in Fertõrakos, where the Hungarians have their beach- and boating area. Somebody needs to invest there. Why don't the communities around the lake go together and invest in public / touristic venues of different character in the various places around the lake and reed belt? Then they could share thje revenue. The investments should be acommpanied by management plans. This would be according to the World Heritage Site plans and intentions.

At the moment, the villages and communities around the lake Fertõ omn the Hungarian side seem to be as cut off from the lake as they were by the Iron curtain barriers earlier. Only now, it's the National Park and Nature reservation restrictions that represent a new type of barrier. NP-authorities, World Heritage Site authorities and villages need to engage with each other. The villages need a new "association" for this, which could make the bridge between the already exixting associations (fishermen's, village embellishment, ...) and the "preservation and management authorities".

The Rakos river and the little tourist trains constitute the connection between village/town and lake/reed. The fishermen's association manage the river banks for easy access.

 

The tourist train with school children in this case.

After Fertõrakos, we went to the dNature reserve area on the South eastern part of the lake. We wlaked around on the small roads and mounted on the wiewing platforms. This is a part of the lake where the sky, the clouds, the wind in the reeds, the sound of birds and brown humus-rich water dominate the senses! It is a place like no other where I have been: mainly because of the sound of the wind in the reeds. A world apart from everything else.

"Brown water" in the reeds. The water in the open lake is "grey water": sediments are being moved all the time because of the wind and the shallowness of the water.

Katarine, Pedro and Adnne Katrine don't kvow Hungarian som we walked into a forbidden dray Pond in the area where wet meadows and wetland have been restaured. We walked on dry "rubbery" mud. RED LETTERS on the National Park signs mean that you are not allowed to enter.

Then we loooked at thje spa hotel in Hegykõ (naturally 55 degree hot water spring!, , the old spa / Kurhotel from the 18th century in Fertobos, the Glorietta connected to that old bathing place and which was also connected to the Szchenyi castle in Nagycenk.  While we visited the healthy water spring in Balf, a lot of people came to collect water from it in bottles to take home.

Water connects everything in the region, in the past and now. The connections is not clear though at the moment. How can it be made more apparent? The reed belt is a 6 km widechallenge! We want to tell the story of the water for the 21st. century.

 

Local water management.                                                                      A happy slovenian in the reeds.

To be continued!