A bow before the “prince of the Mecsek oasis”

Itinerary

• In Orfű follow the S+ sign south to the edge of the village, then enter the forest.
• Turn right and make a detour to the Dragon Gorge on the Z● sign.
• Return to Dózsa György Street on the S+ sign.
• Continue straight on the Z sign past the Lóri lodge until Vágotpuszta.
• Descend back to the side of the Lóri lodge from Vágotpuszta on the Z sign.
• Follow the S◼ sign to the right along the Lóri valley.
• Turn left on the S sign and follow it through Orfű to the mills.
• From the mills, the Vízfő nature trail ZT sign leads to the Vízfő spring.
• From the Vízfő spring, join the ZΩ sign, then turn right on the Z sign towards Szilvás area.
• Join Kossuth Lajos Street (main road) via the unmarked Dózsa György Street, then go right on the S+ sign to reach the bus stop.

Detailed tour description

There is no dragon

Start the route along the road connecting Orfű with Pécs, and after a short ascent, reach the 19th-century Saint Martin bishop's chapel, then turn left downhill following the S+ sign. The street ends with a descent to a creek bridge; here turn right into the forest, and following the creek’s ditch on a grassy path, head to the Dragon Gorge. Soon a stony track calls to the right into the creek bed, bordered by Z● signs. At the valley's bottom lie large moss-covered boulders and fallen tree trunks, which may hinder progress. The cool air of the gorge is not long, but the scenery among the slopes is astonishing. The huge blocks are pieces detached from moss-covered cliff surfaces, while smaller pebbles were brought by the sometimes raging water carving persistently into the rock. The creek is fed from the Szuadó and Körtvélyes valleys splitting into the high block of Jakab Mountain, a karst area full of sinkholes and springs, so the creek only overflows after particularly heavy rain. The Dragon Spring with the same name is found in the gorge; water flows continuously from its pipe in a weak stream. (Local legends frequently mention the dragon motif: a frightening figure living in rock hollows, its roar echoes the sounds of karst processes, and its raging represents the destructive flooding karst water.) It's worth entering a little higher in the valley where after much rain, small rapids and waterfalls may be seen; otherwise, the ditch can be nearly or completely dry.

Return to the street, follow the Z sign straight out of the houses. Turning right, approach the forest across a wide meadow; on its edge appears the Mecsek House, the center for local cave research and tours, which also serves as accommodation and exhibition space. We can use its rest facilities or services at the end of the tour, as the route closes here in a loop. Next to the house, the forest swallows up the path, starting a long mild climb. The woods, dominated by hornbeams mixed with oaks, lindens, and beeches, are formed by trees of various ages. We walk uneventfully on a wide forest road, joining a stone-lined path supported by older forests and early on glimpsing clearings with farms towering at the edge of Lóri valley. After a short descent, we arrive at the fence of the Lóri lodge—a simple building formerly used as a forester's house. Nearby is a hunting lodge and the iron-tasting Lóri spring.

Ghost village in the shadow of the invisibles

Leaving the lodge and passing a wooden cabin, we follow the Z sign turning right over a clearing of lush vegetation at a wet valley junction, making a detour to Vágotpuszta. We climb up a narrowing, dark ditch on a narrow path until turning left, the track invites through trees then joins a dozer road. Following this winding road, we reach the houses of Vágotpuszta on the ridge, which before becoming deserted was the highest settlement (403 m) in Baranya county and the Mecsek. The small outskirts group now belongs to Mánfa. It has no permanent residents; renovated buildings serve as holiday homes. Vágotpuszta developed along an important route crossing the mountain north from Pécs, maintained since Roman times, its history starting with an inn opening in the late 18th century. Swabian and Hungarian families settled around the inn, yet little now recalls its better days except the white-walled bell tower, with a commemorative plaque marking perhaps the most important historical episode.

In the final days of the 1956 revolution and freedom fight, a partisan unit mostly of Pécs defenders, called the "Mecsek invisibles," fought Soviet forces in the mountain forests for about three weeks. Their numbers were a few hundred, and Vágotpuszta was one of their key gathering points (around 300 people). Captured members' later trial reports mention the "Vágotpuszta oath," in which their leader (the "Master") swore them to fight to the death. The relatively well-organized force divided into smaller units not only tried to slow the Soviet advance but also inflicted painful losses on the occupiers, proving that resistance still existed (contrary to state broadcasts). Although they had to leave Vágotpuszta, when it became clear no Western help was arriving, they returned, and their leader released them from the oath and disbanded the group. A memorial post was erected in their honor; interestingly, the name "invisibles" has survived despite the Kádár regime’s propaganda trying to belittle their significance.

Vágotpuszta's striking building is the painted Valden and Énok house, dedicated to a 12th-century religious sect founded in Provence, the Waldensians who opposed the pope and church. At one time, the village was home to Lajos Kiss, a naturalist famous for developing and operating the Mecsek network of lodges and tourist houses, who also ran a lodge there. We leave Vágotpuszta the same way we approached it and descend back into Lóri Valley.

Following lost horses and vanished crayfish

Here, turn right before the house and continue on the S◼ sign. The Lóri Valley preserves the memory of the horse route once used for timber hauling (called lóre), but today the path offers wild natural scenery. Initially, we follow a dense, shallow depression, then a deeply cut ditch cuts into the mountain. The path crosses the creek several times, which after rain forms small rapids or pools. The valley slopes, scattered with rocks and boulders, receive short erosion channels from the side—this is the most beautiful section of the tour. Its lower gorge is flanked by the Nagy-kő side, near which shepherd lodgings once stood, and local tradition says horse sacrifices were made by the time of the Hungarian conquest. As fords disappear, turn left (now following the S signs) and although trees obscure it, accompany the Toplica Creek (from which Mecsekrákos, a part of Orfű, derives its name from the crayfish once living there). Its name means warmth, as its water was once fed by a hot spring, which was depleted by 1950s drilling. Orfű bottles a mineral water named Toplica from a local well. Soon we follow Béke Street at the village edge, cross the creek, and see the spring house on the left.

We arrive in the village center in a park-like environment, where restaurants (including one featuring traditional wood oven types from various regions) and shops are also found. Here we turn left with the sign, walking mainly among holiday homes, and reach the "green" of the hillside again. After a bend, the vegetation opens to our right, revealing Lake Orfű (or the "Small Lake") sparkling behind the reed screen and valley dam. The first standing water of the lake system was dammed in 1962 for fishing purposes, with a beach operating on the southern shore. Across the village stands Balázs Hill with a lookout, and this side features high-quality wooden houses offering various comfort-level accommodations operated by Mecsekerdő.

Mill Museum

The concrete road passes the huts, circles a deep meadow, and arrives at a traditional mill complex showcasing the mill industry, whose main attraction at first glance is a paper mill with a wheel attached. The building is a reconstruction of the Hird paper mill, which actually couldn’t have operated here, as the plant material needed not only forceful pressing but soaking in especially pure water, conditions found only along larger mountain rivers. The central house of the pleasant water-crossed park is a roller mill that has stood here for centuries and ground grain until the 1950s. A true industrial milestone invented by András Mechwart, it is one of the last representatives of this technology in the country. To the left stands the timber-driven dry mill from Mekény, independent from water flow as it was horse-powered. The mills can be visited by guided tours, and nearby there is a pastry workshop and a shop selling local products, with a bistro a few meters away.

The cave stream raised on the hilltop

We soon see where the water for the mills comes from, following the Vízfő nature trail continuing behind the paper mill on the ZT sign. Following a clearing, and a wide dirt road, we arrive soon at a small basin, dominated by a massive, frame-like concrete colossus nestled among trees. This brutal mark of organic architecture was designed by György Csete (and Jenő Dulánszky) and built in the early 1970s, originally serving the spring water of the adjacent Vízfő spring. The underground structure extending two floors deep to the water level served an astonishing technological function: it basically raised the cave stream into neighboring valleys. Its pumps propelled the water to the Vágotpuszta ridge, from where it entered the Kő-lyuk cave system via a sinkhole. From caves in the lower part of the Nagy-Mély valley, water was diverted through pipelines in a quite environmentally damaging transformation to supply Komló’s growing population and heavy industry. With Komló’s decline (and the construction of a Danube water pipeline), the disturbance of Vízfő was no longer needed from the late 1980s, and since 1989 the spring house is merely an unused monument. Its glass domed roof also hides a resting place for speleologists.

Equally remarkable is the Vízfő spring beside the "attention magnet" building at the bottom of a curtain of ivy-covered rock walls, the prince of the mountain’s springs. Its deep position commands a respectful bow. The Mecsek’s largest water withdrawal point is fed by both karst and non-karst areas lying to the south. The emerald green, crystal clear "mountain water" collects in a small basin before continuing its way, powering not only the visited mill and its former counterparts but also replenishing the Orfű lake system. The stalactitic cave system, mainly in dolomite rocks along tectonic fractures, has only been explored for a few hundred meters, but researchers believe its total length may extend to several kilometers. Its gated entrance is artificial; although in the past it was enlarged by explosions and features concrete walkways and cables, a stalactite section still remains.

Nearby lie unknown origins building remains, where an Árpád era and two 14th-century ruins were uncovered, but their identity is uncertain, with references as a Benedictine monastery or castle. The latter is less likely, though the root of the village’s name "Őrfő" aligns with it. The path continues left behind the spring house (ZΩ sign), reaching a gravel-covered, fenced educational trail, at a corner of which it crosses a bridge. Returning to Mecsek House, we pass under a willow to the spring of cave researchers, its central element an old gravestone. Through the meadow we join the Z sign, which leads right to the village’s main street. Here we turn right again (S+ sign) and soon reach the bus stop. (Next to it are a restaurant and the entrance to the beach.)