The well-known Muntanyes Russes (= roller coaster) are not the unique badland area in the municipality of Sant Vicençde Castellet. In the neighbourhood of Vallhonesta, on the slope of Puigsoler left of the stream of Rubió and just before reaching the quarry, there is the badland of Can Forns which picks the name from the big house that is located on the opposite roadside.
The badland of Can Forns extends about 150 meters in length by about 20 meters in width, next to the road on its mountain side. The lithology is made up of poorly consolidated blue or grey mudstones of the Bartonian stage (Mid Eocene), same as in Muntanyes Russes. The geomorphology that results from the erosion is also essentially the same: a denuded bare rock area with ridges and deep furrows arranged in small arborescent river basins. Small or fragmented marine fossils are often found. There is almost no soil, neither vegetation; just a few plants are able to root in this poor and unstable terrain, but the Aleppo pine (Pinus halepensis) is one of them.
[photo Florenci Vallès and Jordi Badia]