Mountain and Breach Route

The Berg en Breuk route is largely unpaved, so wear sturdy shoes or boots! You will also pass a few walking locks, which means that this route is not suitable for wheelchair users and pushchairs. The starting point of the Berg en Breuk route is on the Schansweg at the Oude Bosweg. Here you can park your car/bicycle. This route is part of the walking route network, so you can always start your route at a different point or extend it with another route. The Berg en Breuk route takes you through a varied landscape, around the hamlet of Bedaf. The area is part of the De Maashorst nature reserve, one of the largest nature reserves in Brabant.

The free brochure of this route is available at the Tourist Information Point in the Uden library and can be downloaded from www.exploremaashorst.nl

The Bedafse Bergen, a steep and elongated drift sand wall that is 18 meters high compared to the surrounding ground level, the highest drift sand wall in North Brabant. The Bedafse Bergen did not always look like this. About 4000-5000 years ago, Brabant was covered with a layer of sand on which mainly oak-birch forest grew. Around 1100, farmers settled in this area and they let their cattle graze in the forests. Due to the increasing grazing, the forest disappeared and the landscape changed into vast heathlands with drift sand. This drift sand was created because the farmers cut the heathland near their farms too often; these sods were mixed with the manure in the barn. To prevent the sand from drifting, hedgerows were constructed on the edge of the fields and hamlets. Because the hedgerows were covered with sand, they came to lie higher. On the dry and infertile flanks of the Bedafse Bergen, Scots pines were planted. The wood of these trees was used as props in the Limburg mines. The drifting sand was successfully fixed at the Bedafse Bergen. Only the elongated shape of the mountains and the oaks on the 'mountain tops' remind us of the former wooded bank. Nowadays, forest management is focused on more deciduous trees and nature development in combination with recreational use.

The Leijgraaf was originally a meandering stream that reached from Boekel to the mouth in the Aa near Heeswijk. The existing stream clay shows that a stream ran here between and after the ice ages. In the 16th century, farmers started digging a waterway that had to drain the excess water. The water often overflowed the banks and was difficult to remove from the area. The marshy and unproductive stream valley was used as hayfield for centuries. These areas were often referred to as'Broek\\\'. Broek means marsh or land without water discharge. By improving the drainage and then canalization, the floods are a thing of the past. For agriculture, the water level is now kept artificially high by an inlet from the Aa near Veluwe. The nature policy plan from 1990 offered the opportunity to create ecological connection zones and to provide the Leijgraaf with more natural forms. Nowadays, the vast majority of the Leijgraaf is provided with natural banks and wet corners with small woods. The fish ladders offer fish free access to the entire Leijgraaf. This makes the Leijgraaf a wet Ecological Corridor (EVZ) and provides a connection to the surrounding nature reserves.

The subsurface of the Netherlands is intersected by a large number of faults. On the surface, there is often nothing visible. The fault in and around Uden is called the Peelrand fault and is one of the few places in the Netherlands (and even the surrounding area) where the fault effect is visible in the landscape. The Peelrand fault between Bedaf and Buurtschap't Loo marks the transition between the Peelhorst and the lower Central Slenk. The Peelrand fault continues deep into the subsurface and is millions of years old.

Wijst soils are rare and hardly occur elsewhere in Europe. In North East Brabant there are several places where Wijst soil occurs. But what is Wijst actually? Groundwater flows from high to low areas. At the Peelrand fault the flow is hampered because the soil behind the fault is denser and does not allow water to pass through. This causes the water to rise and reach the surface, this is called seepage water. Contrary to what you would expect, the high grounds are wet and the lower grounds remain dry. We call this special form of seepage Wijst.

In the past, there was not much appreciation for the Wijst grounds. On the contrary, they were seen as problem areas. After all, the grounds had not many possible uses due to their high groundwater level. That is why drainage ditches were dug, resulting in the area becoming drier. The peat disappeared, the farmers were able to exploit the land, and differences in height were levelled out. Much of the Wijst disappeared as a result. It was not until the 1970s that the area was once again appreciated for this special nature and efforts were made to restore the area. In 2004, the Wijst area in Uden was declared a geological monument by the province of Noord-Brabant. Nowadays, the management of the area is aimed at preventing desiccation; a high groundwater level is important to preserve the Wijst.

The difference in height along which the walking route runs, also called the escarpment, is approximately 2 metres high at the Annabos. The escarpment makes the tectonic effect, i.e. the disruption of the earth layers of the Peelrand fault, visible in the landscape. The information panel near the Wijstgrond explains, among other things, why the vegetation on top of the escarpment differs so much from the vegetation at the bottom.

Iron stirrers

In some places, the groundwater naturally contains a great deal of dissolved iron, which, as soon as it comes into contact with oxygen, is deposited on the soil in oxidised form. Under the cover sand lies a Meuse bed, in which gravel banks alternate with sand dunes. When the iron-rich groundwater is pushed up by the sand dunes into the pebble bank, the iron oxide precipitates through oxidation and the pebbles are cemented into an iron ore bank. The seepage water at this location turns rusty brown after it comes into contact with oxygen. When this process is repeated in the same place, large hardened iron concentrations are created: the iron ore banks. This dense, hard, reddish-brown soil layer has the property that it does not allow water to pass through well.

This route was developed by IVN Uden department.