6th Dec 1988 - Les Landes

We moved well south last night, going around the Gironde Estuary to Bordeaux and then back to the coast at the Bassin d'Arcachon. Here there is an area of extensive forest, mostly conifers, known as Les Landes. The forest looks almost natural, but was in fact planted as part of a reafforest­ation policy which began about 150 years ago.

Until the eighteenth century this area was a vast marshy plain. But Atlantic rollers had piled up high sand dunes along the coast, and the west­erly gales were whipping them inland at the rate of some twenty metres a year. The sand was chang­ing the marsh to a desert, engulfing small vil­lages and even menacing the Bordeaux vineyards.

In 1776 a French road and bridge engineer by the name of Bremontier proposed that the sands be fixed by planting a species of deep‑rooting wild grass and a quick‑growing variety of pine. Sup­ported by the government, which took temporary possession of the land, Bremontier's plan was carried out. There was, naturally, opposition from landowners and shepherds who tried to recover their pasture­land and sometimes went so far as to set the plan­tations on fire. The work took fifty years. Then the remain­ing marshes were drained and also planted with pines. The result was the greatest continuous forest expanse in western Europe, over a million hectares of produc­tive woodland.

Today this forest stretches for 250 km along the coast and up to 100 km inland. It is a mono­tonous, and often gloomy, landscape; very thinly populated except for the touristy coastal strip. A few farms along the main road comprised huge flat fields with huge irrigation systems. Maize was the main crop. The forest has, however, brought prosperity to a hitherto poor area, for the trees are used for timber and paper making, and the resin is tapped for glue and other products.

Forest fires have been a problem; in 1949 fire devastated some 300,000 ha and a number of fire-fighters were killed. Now techniques have been developed to control fire, for example by ploughing wide firebreaks, and by having well organised fire-fighting teams. Camping is not allowed in any state forest, not only because the camper might start a fire, but also he risks being caught in one.