The Balkan group with Dr Malcolm Petyt (right), YDNPA member champion for recreation management, at Gordale Scar. Photo: Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority.

The Yorkshire Dales this week played host to visitors from three Balkan states during a fact-finding tour of the national park.

The representatives of government departments and conservation groups in Kosovo, Serbia and Albania also visited the Forest of Bowland area of outstanding natural beauty.

Members of the Balkans Peace Park Project joined them for part of the stay. The project is a UK-based charity working in the mountainous region of the Balkans bordering Albania, Kosovo and Montenegro. The charity works to protect the environment in the area from uncontrolled development, while encouraging sustainable tourism.

In 2008, Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority ranger services manager Alan Hulme and access ranger Paul Sheehan went to the Balkans Peace Park to stage practical workshops and discuss the creation of a possible longer-term collaboration between the YDNPA and the Peace Park.

The Balkan visitors looked around Wensleydale and Malhamdale, taking in the impressive limestone gorge at Gordale Scar.

David Butterworth, the Dales authority’s chief executive, said: “This latest visit by colleagues from the Balkans is part of a continuing collaboration that sees us exchanging ideas and working practices so we can all improve the way in which we look after our surroundings.”

The Balkan visitors spent three days in the area.