Generally i always go the top route and then walk above the house then south ignoring the mines. then near the community center and then to the beach. then towards the spring onion area and around the lake circling back to my farm through the bottom are there more efficient routs? i feel like im missing stuff using this route and i dont wanna do that
One trick you can do, if you want, is to run through the day, finding all the foragables, then resetting the day and going back to collect them all rapidly. But generally there are more efficient ways of generating Foraging xp than actual foraging. On the Forest Farm, for example, you can use your first copper to upgrade your axe and start grinding the six renewable stumps daily for 200 Foraging xp/day fairly rapidly, aside from whatever other trees you chop down. And recall that any trees in Cindernsnap Forest will naturally regrow without needing to be replanted, so you can really grind foraging xp pretty quickly if you want without ever needing to touch a foragable. The important reason to forage are the bundles, really. Once you get at least one of each, getting more is of lesser value. You might be able to sell them, but the profits aren't huge unless you're on Day 1 trying to afford 50+ parsnips to get a head start on your Farming skill.
To touch on this, this is my main method of gaining foraging experience. It's highly useful, relatively quick, and VERY effective on the forest map, as you mentioned. As you gain more levels, and select perks, you will notice how fast you tear through trees and stumps. Not to mention, I believe the logs that grant hardwood tend to give a little more experience. So, I'd say make a tree farm on your property, or use the forest map for fast foraging leveling.
The map is the size it is, and if you want to cover every part of it, it makes little difference which way round you go. I only really care about covering the whole map on day 1, and fwiw, I tend to go as follows: Backwoods - Mountain - Town (north half) - Bus stop - Farm (to drop off items) - Forest - Onion area - Town (south half) - Beach - back to Farm But, I don't actually think it's more advantageous than going in the opposite direction, it's just my personal preference Day 1 aside, walking round the whole valley and picking up items isn't a particularly fast way to make money at any point in the game; from day 2 onwards, there is always a better way to make money. About as good as Foraging gets as an income stream is planting summer forage seeds in Year 1 and having them watered by sprinklers. If you have Foraging 5 Gatherer, for the 20% chance of a double dip, then at this point they actually compare favourably with unprocessed summer crops, in terms of gold per day. Most players who aren't min-maxing do not have much in the way of processing capability in the first summer anyway, so they're actually a decent income, and it's still pretty easy to jump from Farming 6 to Farming 10 in Fall with pumpkins, it doesn't actually need much money. The only other time wild seeds make sense is in Winter, when they are literally the only thing you can plant. Put them in the ground, let the sprinklers do the donkey work for a week, and harvest and replant for a decent passive income by the end of the season. If you're thinking more about Foraging XP than gold, you don't want to be watering forage seeds by hand, because the return on your time and energy expenditure is horrible. The same as for money, they're only worth considering if you have sprinklers to water them. After that, chopping the large stumps with a Steel axe or better is the best bet for Foraging XP - each one is approximately the same XP as felling two trees, so it's less time and energy for the same result. It's nice to reach Foraging 6 for Lightning Rods before thunderstorms start in Summer, so getting those first two axe upgrades early should be a top priority in Spring at Clint's.
