It was the first sunny and warm day of this year so time to put on our walking shoes and to go for a walk. Since a few days we are in the possession of a GPS and Topo maps so this was also an opportunity to see how the GPS works. We downloaded a GPS-track from the Dutch site GPSWalking and transferred it to our GPS. Most pictures can be enlarged by clicking on them.

We opted for a 10-kms walk in De Meinweg National Park. De Meinweg National Park is a park of terraced landscape caused by fault lines below the surface. The four terraces bridge a height of about 50 metres and feature woodland, health land, bog pools and streams.
De Meinweg is the only nature area in the Netherlands where a population of wild boars is allowed to roam freely. The adder also occurs here. De Meinweg National Park forms part of the German-Dutch Cross-border Park Maas-Swalm-Nette

After a couple of 100 metres an Anguis Fragilis or better known as slowworm/blindworm crossed our path. In Dutch this creature is called a Hazelworm. It is a limbless reptile, which is active during the day (diurnal) and occasionally basks in the sun, but is more often found hiding beneath rocks and logs.



Slowworms are often mistaken for a snake, but have some distinctive features which differentiate them from snakes: