UBC October 2026 - What goes up must come down 🐄

Let's change scenery.

From the Grison mountains or Valais to Lauterbrunnen, a village in the wonderful Bernese Oberland that has become something of a poster child for overtourism. People come here for the famous Staubbach Falls, where the water drops almost 300 metres (985 feet), and for the proximity to Mürren, from where you can take the cable car up to the Schilthorn for the Piz Gloria views and the James Bond exhibit. (In the 1969 James Bond film On Her Majesty's Secret Service, the Schilthorn summit and its revolving restaurant were called Piz Gloria.)

I went there because I thought the Alpabzug, aka alpine descent, might be extra scenic.

Wait, what exactly is an Alpabzug?

Depending on the region, in May or June Swiss farmers take their cows and goats up to a higher-altitude alp, where they spend the summer grazing on lush green meadows. This is also where Alpkäse, the famous Swiss alpine cheese, is made.

In September or October, the animals return to the valley, where they are welcomed not only by the local community but also by hundreds of tourists who come to watch this traditional Swiss event.

The return from the alp has been celebrated for centuries, essentially as a thanksgiving for a safe summer without accidents or losses. The decorated cows, bells, traditional dress, cheese, food and all the rest aren't inventions of tourism.

I feel it used to be:

“The farmers are coming down today. Come watch the cows go past, have a Bratwurst and a beer, and say hello to your neighbour.”

Well... today, in some places, it's a whole day's entertainment: shuttle buses bringing visitors up for an alpine brunch, folk music, a Chilbi (fairground), and then an evening barn festival with food, drinks and dancing.

In other places, there are yodelers, alphorns, country music, food stalls, local products and crafts.

So how do I best put this?

I am a tourist in my own country, so yes, I contribute to the circus. I do like to think that I am a considerate tourist, though. I stay on the sidewalk and don't feel the urge to literally jump into the street to take pictures. Better yet, I hike a little outside the village centre to get an almost people-free experience.

And then there's the “clean-up” feature on my phone that lets me erase annoying disturbances. ;-)

So let's talk about our alpine farmers.

Their livelihood depends on so much they can't control, with the weather being the obvious big one.

Imagine it's spring. Your cherry trees begin to blossom. Everything is pretty and lovely, and then, boom, one night the temperature drops and your blossoms freeze. No cherries in June.

Or the cherries are doing beautifully and are almost ready to be picked, and then ten minutes of thunderstorm and hail later, they're gone.

Summer 2026 has been particularly brutal. The prolonged heat and drought have caused major problems for Swiss agriculture: hay and maize yields were down, potatoes suffered their worst harvest on record, and some farmers were already feeding their winter reserves to their animals. The federal government even temporarily eased the import of feed maize to help make up for the shortages.

Even without natural disasters, farming is hard. Farmers get up in the middle of the night to milk the cows, work hard day in, day out, and, despite the subsidies, have to work pretty damn hard to make a living.

In other words, they welcome any additional source of income.

So yes, they will smile for the cameras and set up village festivities for the tourists.

But I wonder if, inside, some of them are fuming.

Because I sort of am.

Some tourists behave with the appropriate amount of respect. Others don't.

Just the most basic principle of “let passengers exit the train before you board” seems to be lost on some people.

And at some point things must have become so bad that locals had to put up fences and Private property — no trespassing signs to prevent strangers from wandering through their gardens, or worse, as I heard on TV, simply lying down in one of the deckchairs.

I beg your pardon?

And the more tourists these villages attract, the greater the absolute number of inconsiderate ones becomes.

Which is the slightly uncomfortable part of this story: I am one of those tourists, too.

The difference, I hope, is that I know I'm a guest.

Is there a solution - what do you think?

Video: Alpine Descent