Balance between people and nature
A unique place to reconnect
Come to Urdaibai and bring out the ecotourist in you!
Urdaibai, paradigm of the balance between people and nature. An extraordinarily beautiful space where nature, heritage and culture, its villages and its people coexist in harmony, a landscape rich in contrasts with an extraordinary naturalistic value. 22,000 hectares integrated in a mosaic of cliffs, mountains, beaches, rivers and subway waters, offering a spectacular landscape full of animal and human life. Urdaibai, now, almost forty years after its declaration as a Biosphere Reserve, is shown as a destination to know and enjoy layer by layer: its culture, its identity, its nature, its gastronomy, its wines and its high quality of life.
Balance between people and nature
The first people who inhabited this place began a respectful transformation of the environment that has lasted for centuries. The preservation of its landscape, its estuary and its rich ecosystems, together with the wise action of human beings in the territory, merited its declaration as a Biosphere Reserve in 1984. Its high biodiversity index indicates the environmental quality of its territory, with more than 3,300 species and subspecies in its different habitats: coastline and cliffs, marshes and sandbanks, forests and Atlantic countryside.
Territory of sustainability
A place where human activity has shaped the landscape for thousands of years. It is a territory for sustainability, because, just as their ancestors did, the 45,000 people who live here are committed to making their daily lives compatible with what nature and its ecosystems provide. Fishing and agriculture, the transformation of products for their enjoyment and their combination with a privileged environment make Urdaibai a destination in which to live the identity of the place.
Oka estuary, backbone of the landscape
The natural heart of Urdaibai is the Oka estuary which, on its way to the Cantabrian Sea, becomes an estuary or estuary and offers us a spectacle full of life: with a great variety of landscapes resulting from centuries of balanced coexistence between nature and the 22 villages that inhabit it.
If we accompany the Oka estuary on its way to the sea, we will get to know a coast shaped by a force of its own character, the Cantabrian Sea. A tidal sea that has not only formed our beaches and cliffs, but is also the source of life of our fishing villages such as Mundaka, Elantxobe, Ea or Bermeo, the first capital of Bizkaia, which still preserves an active fishing industry. Upstream of the estuary, the marsh becomes an internationally recognized resting wetland for migratory birds.
Inland, the Urdaibai emerges from the mountains, forests and valleys. Its small rural villages, anteiglesias and baserris have modeled a beautiful landscape of Atlantic countryside that supplies local and seasonal products. An example of this is the Gernika bell pepper or Txakoli, products that can be found in the rural markets of the villages. It is worth mentioning the one held every Monday in the foral village of Gernika-Lumo, symbol of the Basque people and peace.