Abr jungle

Address:  45 km Northeast of Shahrud -Semnan – Iran

This jungle is part of the oldest and most beautiful forests of Iran, with rare herbs and animals, one of the most beautiful parts of Iran and the north-east of the country. This forest with 35,000 hectares extends beyond the lush forests of the north of the country because of the fact that in most cases the atmosphere of this forest is known as the ocean of cloud. In the forest, the clouds are so close to the trees that it seems that the forest rides on the clouds and can be traversed among the clouds and, according to many tourists, is one of the most beautiful views of the nature of Iran.

The forestry plan was to revive and enrich the ruined forests of the Cloud in 1991, covering an area of 11216 hectares of northern slopes. Also, more than 200 hectares of the above-mentioned areas and planting of seedlings such as oak, maple, larder, alder, van, acacia, wild pear, marmorozo, a number of needles of the leaves of the forest of pine and seedling with varieties of van, hornbeam, Oak, wild pear and the operation above is still in place.

This forest is the 114th natural effect that was introduced by the Cultural Heritage Organization on February 09, 2011 in the Natural Heritage List of Iran. At the meeting of the Supreme Environmental Council on February 18, 2015 the forest protected area cloud was announced and was listed in the four areas of the Environmental Protection Agency.

The forest dates back to the Hyrcanian forests, which is one of the remnants of the third era of geology.

This forest is located in the central Alborz region near the village of Cloud (Shahrood) and is almost the border of the Semnan province of Golestan province [3]. Cloud forest after passing through the gardens of Bastam, 45 km north of Shahrood, is located along the road of Shahroodbah Azad, with geographical coordinates of 57 and 54 to 12 and 55 east and 42, 36 to 50 and 36 north latitudes.

Cloud Forest is important to the world for three reasons:

  • It is part of the ancient Hirkanian forests and has medicinal herbs
  • The ecotone of this area is important, the borderline between the two semi-desert and forest ecosystems. So that in the forests of this area, we can see the trees in needle trees alongside the broad trees, which has also been influential in animal species.
  • The special geography of the area, which places two low and high altitudes together, is important, as we witness the formation of an ocean of clouds in the area, which is a phenomenon in the world .

In addition to natural beauty, the low profile, such as the existence of various species of woody plants along with rare species of plants such as rush, oak, alder, elm, wild cherry, rainbow, yew, like them, have created these lands, such as live bananas to attract tourists Domestic and foreign. Part of the foreign tourists in the region are botanists who come to Iran to see the rare plant species found in the Hirkani forests, and the second group is common tourists who come from Central and Middle Eastern countries

The cloud forest is located in a region that is diminished by the thickness of the Alborz Mountains, and the clouds caught behind the wall flow through the valleys to the south; therefore, from about afternoon until midnight, with the cooling of the air, the forest is mounted on clouds. The proximity of the two low-pressure and high-pressure areas (the Gorgan plain and the Cloud area) makes the clouds move every time the earth enters the energy and it seems that the clouds come down from the sky. This has transformed the cloud area.