Estonia, Soomaa National Park

Estonia, a small country in north-eastern Europe, has neither grand landscapes of deep canyons, breathtaking mountains nor even proper uplands. The highest point of Estonia, and the Baltics – the Big Egg ‘mountain’ – is only 318m above sea level. Nonetheless, the country is a real treat for nature lovers and walkers with wonderfully bucolic and wooded scenery. About half of Estonia's territory is forest, inhabited by many animals that are very rare or no longer found at all in western Europe, like wolves, brown bears, wild boars and lynx. Its national parks are great for wildlife spotting, and especially birdwatching, due to the country's key position on north-south migration routes.

Soomaa National Park is one of the most alluring places to enjoy nature at its wildest. The name stands for ‘land of bogs’, and indeed, the land abounds with floodplain grasslands, meandering rivers, forests and raised bogs. The land is so susceptible to flooding in the spring that the floods are regarded as the ‘fifth season’ in Soomaa. The rivers cannot contain all the melting snow and the water flows over the More...