Vinnesleira

Bays that are shallow far out into the sea, with fine sand and clay, are rare in Hordaland. Where they are found, the reason is usually that the edge of the glacier made smaller advances or stopovers when it calved back at the end of the last Ice Age. This is what happened at Vinnesleira.

Øpstad

The post house at Øpstad stands out in the landscape. An ochre yellow house with a loft and a white-painted house in Swiss style with ochre edgings, bears witness to a well preserved house from the 1800s, nearest neighbour to the beautiful old vicarage. In the Øpstad hamlet there was a post office for more than a hundred years, until the 1970s. Today it is possible to walk the old post road across the mountain to Strandvik, as part of “Den Stavangerske Postvei” (The post road to Stavanger).

Børtveit

Børtveit is known to be a place with a lot of rain. We must go to Samnanger or Indre Matre to find a higher rainfall. The average rainfall on Børtveit is 2871 millimetres, Slåtterøy has only 1328 millimetres and Fitjar 1610 millimetres.

Brandvikneset

Dalskarvatnet–Dyvikvågen

Many of the fossils one finds on Stord are related to fossils of the same age found in North America. Scientists thinks this indicates that the bedrock on Stord was much nearer to America at that time than today.

Digernes

Despite the fact that the animal life on Stord is better investigated and studied than most other places in Hordaland, we were not clear about the diversity in Digernes forest until the triple junction was almost finished being planned.

Hovaneset

Huglo

The majority of Huglo is bare rock. A bit of dwarf pine forest is the only vegetation able to put down roots. Along the west- and east sides, to the contrary, the landscape is unusually green and lush. The reason lies both in the bedrock and in the ice that covered the area 12 000 years ago.

Hystad- burial mounds

The biggest collection of prehistoric burial relics in Stord is to be found in Hystadmarka. There are still 16 burial mounds and two stone rings visible here; finds that span from the Bronze Age to the Viking Age in time.

Hystad- the black alder forest

One of the biggest black alder forests in the country is in Hystadmarkjo. Along the well prepared trail through the forest you can experience an exceptional nature with an unusual abundance of exuberant plant species. But what has laid the foundation for this richness?