The Bovec Panorama by Soča Valley Tourist Board

NATuRE TRAIL LANDFORMS of the Bovec Region

t h e

e m e r a l d

t r a i l

ca rt

www.bovec.si

THe BOvEC PANORAma

Bovec

in a nteau K la

the Bovec mountain panorama and gravel terrace

Above and left: Illustration of the position of glaciers on the edge of the Bovec basin at the end of the last glacial period.

Bavški Grintavec (2347m) located on the same ridge, particularly stand out in this regard.

PREDEL KLUŽE

PLUŽNA

GLACIERS

BOKA WATERFALL

Boka

BOVEC

KAL–KORITNICA

info

VIRJE WATERFALL

P AIRFIELD

Glijun

A large number of U-shaped valleys in the area is a sign of a glacial activity in the past. At the peak of glaciation, the several hundred meter thick and 60km long Soča glacier reached from the valley of the upper Soča all the way down to the town of Most na Soči.

T1-2

GOLF

Alpe Adria Trail

Bovec Airfield

Učja ŽAGA

KOBARID

Soča

Soča Alpe Adria Trail

TRENTA–VRŠI Č

Soča Č EZSO Č A

BOKA

U ČJA–IT REZIJA TARCENTO

Ko rit ni ca

a l o n g

Lead partner and editor: En Hec d.o.o. Pravljica v Bovcu concept, project and manager: Metka Belingar. Author of trail content and Slovene texts: dr. Jurij Kunaver. Expert revision: dr. Blaž Komac. Translations: Evridika Cuder. Photography: Metka Belingar, Ivo Ivančič, Jurij Kunaver, Anja Rebek, archive LTO Bovec - Danijel Žagar. Ground plan: Stanko Buser. Relief Model: Jože Pirnat. Google Earth: Bovška kotlina 46o 20’ 00’’ N in 13o 33’ 00’’ E, 5. September 2014. Graphic design and illustrations: Metka Belingar. Prepress and printing: Copigraf. Quantity: 2500 copies. Bovec, 2014. This document has been produced within the project »Pravljica v Bovcu« with the financial assistance of the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development. The Managing Authority Rural Development Programme for the period 2007-2013, the Ministry of Agriculture and the Environment. Responsible for the content: EN HEC d.o.o.

The Bovec Panorama

Slateni k

THe BOvEC PANORAma

Občina Bovec

the Bovec mountain panorama and gravel terrace

On its way to the Adriatic sea, the Soča Valley has paved a zigzag path through the mountainous landscape. At the village of Žaga, it performs an almost full U-turn from the Alpine (W–E) to the Dinaric direction (NW–SE). In search of the shortest way to the sea, the water has carved characteristic narrow and steep gorges on the sections that traverse the Alpine orographic mountain direction. An example of such a gorge is the narrow and deeply carved valley of Koritnica above the Kluže Fortress, which divides the Rombon massif from the peak of Krnica. Another interesting phenomenon by the Kluže Fortress (lat. claustra, blockade) is the 60m deep narrow gorge, formed on the threshold between the higher lying side valley and the lower main valley. With the exception of the vast Bovec basin, which runs parallel to the orographic mountain direction range, steep mountainsides and sharp peaks are characteristic for the rest of the valleys in the area. This is the result of heavy water and glacial erosion, but also of prevailing steep lying thrust plains resulting in steep lying rock layers. The mountain of Svinjak (1637m), also known as the Bovec Matterhorn ica Krn and

info

LEGEND

info point

P parking lot

hiking trail

viewpoint

45 min

3 km

thematic point road 10 min 500 m

dificulty 1

map other thematic nature trails around Bovec

TIC Bovec Tel: +386 (0)5 384 19 19 Trg golobarskih žrtev 8 Gsm: +386 (0)31 388 700 5230 Bovec, Slovenia E-mail: info@bovec.si

project by: En hec d.o.o.

www.bovec.si

Evropski kmetijski sklad za razvoj podeželja: Evropa investira v podeželje. Projekt sofinancira EU.

Veliki vrh / Rombon 2208 m

Geographical features Polovnik 1482 m

THE BOVEC GRAVEL TERRACE

- The Bovec basin is the geographical centre of the Bovec

At the end of the last glacial period, numerous glacier tongues reached all the way down to the Bovec basin and left behind frontal moraines at its edges. A bit further towards the south, glacial waters created glacial lake sediments, which are today the thickest at the village of Srpenica. The melting and retreating glaciers filled the bottoms of the valleys with gravel and caused the formation of stepped gravel terraces, especially in the Bovec basin. The Bovec gravel terrace has an inclination of 14‰ and surface of 5km2. It is the largest terrace in the Upper Soča Valley and a genuine natural phenomenon. Although there are no visible traces of a forerunner to the Soča river here, the only possible explanation for its formation would be a river once flowing on this territory, filling the area with gravel.

municipality, which covers the entire basin of the Soča Bovec

Čezsoča to the village of Trnovo ob Soči. It - river from the source Soča in Slovenia in terms of is one of the largest municipalities

- surface area (367km2) and one of the smallest in terms of population (3,186). The lowest point is at the village of

- Srpenica by the Soča river (315m) and the highest on the

Holocene

0,01 ml 1,8 ml

Pleistocene

Jurassic Cretaceous Tertiary Triassic

Cenozoic

65 ml 145 ml 190 ml

Mesozoic

228 ml

Quaternary

top of Triglav, the highest mountain in Slovenia (2864m). 0 The Bovec 1 km basin is considered to be one of the largest relief depressions in the Julian Alps. It is a part of the Soča Valley and the western part of the Slovenian Alpine world, or the Bovec Julian Alps and is the juncture of three long and two short valleys. The longest among them is the valley of the upper Soča in the east (with the side valleys of Lepena, Vrsnica, Zadnjica in Trenta and the valley of Zapoden) followed by the Koritnica valley together with Možnica and Loška Koritnica in the northeast, as well as the Učja valley in the west. On the edges of the Bovec basin the shorter Bavšica and Slatenik valleys are located. 457 m

slope gravel

river and stream deposits – alluvium

older deposits of the Soča river

older conglomerate

moraines

MALA VAS 452 m

(gravel, sand, conglomerate)

BOVEC 460 m

KORITNICA 460 m RABELJK 519 m

not present in the Bovec basin

sandstone and marl - flysch

red marlstone and limestone

red limestone and breccia

layered limestone

layered Dachstein limestone

massive and layered dolomite

KAL 450 m 454 m

DVOR 430 m

STRŽIŠČE 486 m

405 m

LETALIŠČE 438 m

faultline 431 m

thrust

1500 -

Veliki vrh / Rombon 2208 m Polovnik 1482 m Čezsoča

1000 -

Above: The view above the village of Kal–Koritnica towards the Bovec basin. Veliko Čelo is an outdoor museum with artilery positions built by the Austro-Hungarian Army during WWI.

368 m

500 m

380 m

SSZ (335°)

JJV (105°)

394 m

450 m

LETALIŠČE 438 m

400 m

418 m 431 m

ČEZSOČA 369 m

300 m

SOČA 364 m

444 m

Ground plan (left) and 0 m (extreme left) cross-section of the Bovec basin.

500m

ČEZSOČA 369 m

nadmorska višina (m)

372 m

500 m

1000 m

NNW (335°)

razdalja (m) 1500 m Above: Marked direction2000 of themcross-section of the Bovec terrace. Cross-section (bottom) and ground plan (middle) of the Bovec terrace on the right bank of the Soča river, and six younger stepped terraces on its left bank in the village of Čezsoča. SSE (105°) 450m

LETALIŠČE 438m SOČA 364m

ČEZSOČA 369m

Soča

300m

500 -

Bovec

SOČA 364 m

400m

2000 -

425 m

Altitude (m)

GEOLOGY

The Bovec basin is unusually broad and vast. This can be explained by taking a closer look at its geological structure. Two faultlines run over it in the Dinaric direction (NW– SE) – the Krn-Kobla and the Ravne faultline. They run parallel to the Idrija faultline, the most important one in this part of Slovenia. All three of them are seismically active, since they result from the subduction of the African under the Eurasian lithospheric plate. The tectonic characteristics of the Bovec basin are those of a syncline, which can be pictured as an open book. The first page is made of Flysch – a rock composed of sandstone and marly layers, deriving from the Upper Cretaceous period, the last era in which this area was still a sea. Flysch decays fast and is mostly present in the Soča gravel and glacial deposits. Below it are thin layers from the lower Cretaceous and Jurassic age. Deeper layers consist of the main rock of the Kanin Mountain Range and all other Bovec mountains – upper Triassic Dachstein limestone lying above dolomite. On the Kanin slopes, the layers of Dachstein limestone are slightly inclined towards the south and sink below the bottom of the Bovec basin. On the other side the same layers occur again on the slopes of Polovnik, where they are positioned almost vertically. The slopes of Javoršček, Svinjak and Krnica have a similar character. The limestone layers on the highest Kanin Karst Plateau have a more horizontal position, which results in the occurrence of numerous limestone pavements.

1 km

500m

1000m

1500m

2000m Distance (m)