Lost landscapes in Belgium

1) Lommelse Sahara

The Lommelse Sahara is a strange desert landscape of pure white sand planted with pine trees. It occupies an abandoned industrial site in the Kempen region where quartz sand was once mined and a polluting zinc factory killed off all the trees. This bleak wilderness was later used by a weapons manufacturer to test grenades, but it has been turned into a nature reserve, with hiking trails, an observation tower and a lake in the former quarry.

water and trees at the Lommelse Sahara

Roel Hendrickx

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