Loftaleden

**The Lofta Trail starts and ends at Lofta Church and is 20 km long.

It passes through varied landscapes in partly hilly terrain with mountain slopes through a living agricultural and forestry landscape. The trail starts at Lofta Church, which dates from 1837 and is one of Sweden's largest rural churches. The trail then continues past one of the many rock carvings that you will pass along the trail. One of these rock carvings is Utrikesstenen which has a unique carving with a man plowing with a horse, sun symbols ships and bowl pits. Several sights passed along the trail include a large Bronze Age cairn and a stone square and shingle field from the Ancylus period (700 BC). In the Bronze Age 2500-4000 years ago, the Baltic Sea stood about 10 meters above today's level.

The ancient remains in Hammar Gamleby show how the sea has retreated. One of the clearest signs of former high water levels is the stone fields at the entrance to Västervik. The large boulders at Gamleby Folkhögskola are reminders of even older times. Lake Ancylus, a former freshwater stage of the Baltic Sea that existed 8700-8000 BC, is believed to have created the shingle fields on the Lofta Trail. The trail also has several rest stops.