Archives

Fernando Hualde.

This is a magic time of the year in mountains, mountaintops…, both from a natural and an ethnographic perspective. Departing from our usual focus on ethnography, let us look at a very specific item.

Thousands and thousands of sheep have already moved from lower, snow-free winter pastures to summer pastures in mountains, mountaintops and higher altitudes along the Navarrese Pyrenees and Urbasa and Aralar Mountain Ranges. Our mountains are filled with the sound of bells worn around the neck of free-roaming sheep, goats, kids, wethers, cattle, mares… The tinkling of livestock bells is in fact the most perfect musical accompaniment to the highland dweller or rambler. (more…)