Binifaldó: 40 Years Learning From the Serra de Tramuntana

To truly understand a place, we often need to walk through it. This is exactly what more than 1,400 students do every year when they come to Binifaldó, in the heart of Lluc Valley. There, among holm oak groves, natural springs and old charcoal production facilities, Camp d'Aprenentatge takes place. This year, it’s celebrating four decades of teaching how the Serra de Tramuntana is managed and protected. It does so on the basis of a time-honoured idea: that the best way to learn about nature is, quite simply, to experience it.

Binifaldó takes up 377 hectares of public land and forms part of a cultural landscape declared a World Heritage Site. Its history is tied to traditional forest management: lime kilns, charcoal burners’ huts, cultivation terraces and stone paths that allow us to explain, through direct experience, how humans have shaped the mountain for centuries. This combination of natural and ethnological heritage makes the site a real outdoor classroom.

The “cases del camp” (country houses), with a capacity for 30 people to stay for one or more days, allow school groups to sleep surrounded by forest. This is the starting point for trails such as the Volta a Sa Moleta de Binifaldó, the path to Es Pixarells, and the routes that lead to Lluc, Puig Tomir and Menut. These trails are designed for different ages and levels, where they can learn about wildlife, plants, land formations, the water cycle and the history of the Serra de Tramuntana.

“What does a grain silo look like? What does a charcoal burner do? How do you look after a holm oak grove? These are common questions at the learning camp. They capture the spirit of the project: turning children’s curiosity into practical knowledge. The workshops allow them to look at insects, identify plants using single-access keys, study erosion, discover how streams originate and discover what karst is. They all have a clear premise: we can only protect what we know and appreciate.

The camp’s anniversary is happening just as the agreement between the Ministries of Agriculture and Education is due for renewal, a gesture that reinforces the institutional commitment to environmental education. Binifaldó was the first learning camp in the regional network, which now includes eight centres in Mallorca, Menorca, Ibiza and Formentera. The camp has become a model replicated in other regions. Its continuity has taught thousands of students that the Serra’s ecosystem is vulnerable and requires management, balance and society’s involvement.

The educational activities are wide-ranging and are suitable for both day visits and overnight stays. Participating schools can do curricular activities related to natural sciences, history, geography or physical education, with the guidance of teachers specialised in fieldwork. The contents are updated every four years and are accompanied by teaching resources ranging from plant journals to videos on traditional crafts.

The camp also promotes Service Learning (SL) projects that allow the students themselves to contribute to improving the environment. In recent years they’ve collected and planted hundreds of holm oak acorns, repaired signage damaged by Storm Juliette, cleaned up recreational areas and worked on path maintenance. These may be simple actions, but they have a strong educational component: to understand that every gesture helps to protect the mountains.

Binifaldó’s location also serves to demonstrate the richness of Escorca, a municipality with a long history, including the ancient manuscript Llibre del Repartiment and the legends of the patron saint, Mare de Déu de Lluc. All this helps to contextualise the landscape around the students and to show that the mountains aren’t just a natural space, but also a cultural one.

Turning forty isn’t just an anniversary. It’s also proof that environmental education continues to be an essential tool for understanding the land and for educating the citizens who will need to look after it in the future. Binifaldó, with its mix of forest, culture and education, is a reminder that learning outside the classroom can shape the way we look at the world forever. And the Serra de Tramuntana, beautiful yet fragile, continues to be the best of teachers.