12. Thinking Like a Mountain, Not Just Reaching It

“Too many people, too many cars, too much noise. In the mountains, people seek silence.” With these words, Reinhold Messner, interviewed this summer by "Il Dolomiti", commented on yet another case of overtourism in the Alps: crowds, paid turnstiles, trails turned into one-way lanes. Seceda feels like a procession, and the Odle range now requires an entry ticket. An assault on the landscape—often chaotic, impulsive, and mindless.

They call it love for the mountains, but ever more often it resembles an escape to higher altitudes from the city, bringing the same pace and desires that chase us in the lowlands. Selfies, performance, the saturation of places. What should be an encounter becomes consumption.

Lorenzo Giusti