Lauterbrunnen, an idyllic village in Switzerland with a 297-meter waterfall

Switzerland is the most mountainous country in Europe. Half of its surface area is covered by mountains, with 48 peaks over 4,000 meters high.

Mitholz, the Swiss town that will be evacuated in 2030 due to a military accident from 1947
The Sphinx observatory and Jungfraujoch, a railway station at more than 3,400 meters

The capital of Switzerland, Bern (with about 122,000 inhabitants), is also the capital of the canton of the same name, in which lies a town whose appearance is so idyllic it seems unreal: Lauterbrunnen. This town of medieval origin currently has about 2,500 inhabitants and is situated at an altitude of 795 meters.

The most widely spoken language in Lauterbrunnen is German (used by around 85% of its inhabitants), and interestingly, its second most common language is Portuguese, spoken by a small Portuguese-speaking community of over a hundred residents, followed by Croatian, with over fifty speakers. This foreign community is partly explained by the importance of tourism to the town's economy and by its extremely low unemployment rate. The majority of Lauterbrunnen's population is Protestant, specifically belonging to the Swiss Reformed Church, with a Catholic minority that likely includes many of its residents of Portuguese and Croatian origin.

Lauterbrunnen lies at the bottom of a valley that bears its name. This valley, one of the deepest in the Swiss Alps, is U-shaped and is like a wall formed by cliffs ranging in height from 400 to 1,000 meters. Because of this, the village attracts many tourists not only for its beauty, but also many climbers seeking new challenges on these rocky walls, as well as BASE jumpers. The town has a train station, built in 1890 and electrified in 1914, which has a traditional appearance like the rest of the village and is an important gateway for tourists.

Lauterbrunnen is known as "the valley of 72 waterfalls", as it is full of waterfalls, some of them quite high. The most famous of the valley's waterfalls is Staubbachfall (below), which is 297 meters high and plunges close to the village, forming a key part of its distinctive landscape, as well as being the tallest free-falling waterfall in Switzerland.

If you'd like to see Lauterbrunnen up close, last year the YouTube channel Tourist Walk Tours published an interesting video visiting this village and showcasing some of its hidden gems. The video has commentary in 89 languages; you can activate it in the bottom bar of the player.

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Main photo: Robin Ulrich.