You begin your tour in the new PreShow, a multimedia presentation. The great poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe accompanies you on a journey through time, exploring the history of tourism.

At various stages, visitors journey through the history of Alpine tourism in Switzerland. The exhibits are directly linked to historical landmarks that can still be experienced today, such as inns, hotels, steamships and mountain railways. A charmingly presented tour guides you through the development of tourism, which has grown to become the most important economic sector for the Alpine region.

Cradle of tourism

For the first travellers who ventured on an adventurous journey into the Alps, there was no way around the small town of Unterseen. Whether on foot or with horse and cart, they stopped here, had a short rest or spent the night in the town house, the castle or the stately vicarage on Obere Gasse. After the town fire in 1470, the Bernese authorities rebuilt the manor house. In 1979, the municipality of Unterseen restored the historic building. The Tourismuseum Association was founded and has been presenting the history of tourism for over 45 years.

The beginnings of tourism

On the ground floor, modules provide information about Goethe’s Swiss journey in 1779, early travellers, the muleteers and traders, places of pilgrimage, spa‘s and Whey cures, the poverty in the Alpine region and the emigrations provoked by it before the development of tourism.

The first Unspunnen festivals (1805 and 1808)

had a tremendous propaganda effect. Visits to the Bernese Oberland with its glaciers and waterfalls were henceforth part of a comprehensive education. A recurring problem for travellers in the 1st half of the 19th century was food and accommodation. There were only a few inns. Before hotels were built in large numbers, strangers stayed at the vicarage or with private individuals. In the second half of the 19th century, the chalet-style inns became comfortable hotels.

Carriages and steamships were the most important means of transport until the 19th century. The expansion of the railway network was important for the development of tourism. With the construction of feeder railways to the mountain areas, the resorts could be reached more quickly and comfortably.

Development of the hotel industry

After the Unspunnen festivities of 1805/1808, a veritable colony of inns developed in Interlaken within just a decade.The initially small family guesthouses quickly multiplied, were enlarged into hotels, and some became in the course of the 19th century into luxurious grand hotels. Time and again, however, development was slowed down by war or economic crises. The 19th century was the era of inventions and industrialisation. Hotels also had to adapt to modernisation.

Suitcases and porters

If the guests arrived by public transport, which was common in the heyday of the hotel industry, they were met at the station by the valet and the hotel omnibuses with their voituriers and porters. These had the task of taking not only the guests themselves but also vast quantities of suitcases, hat boxes and other travel paraphernalia to the hotel.

New means of transport accelerate tourism

The revolutionary transition in tourism in the 1911th century was the result of the invention and introduction of the steam ship and the railway, as well es the expansion of the postal and communication services. Passenger transport systems with high transport capacities, low transport costs and high speeds had been found.

The introduction of railways, which took effect around 1850, allowed transport speeds of 30-60 and more kilometres per hour, accompanied by simultaneous reductions in transport costs. Destinations could now be reached in a few hours that had previously required many days to get there. Such innovations made travel increasingly simple and more popular.

The tourism game

The interactive tourism game provides information about the history of tourist transport in a playful way. Visitors learn many stories via the touch screens.

Alpinism and Hiking

In the early days, summit ascents were purely of scientific interest. Later, mountaineering became a sport, which eventually led to extreme climbing. The Bernese Hiking Trails Association was founded in 1937. Today, there are 65,000 kilometres of hiking trails throughout Switzerland. In the canton of Bern, there are 10,000 kilometres, 4,800 of which are in the Bernese Oberland.

Winter tourism since 1864

The first traces of winter tourism in Switzerland lead to St. Moritz. There is a legend about this: In autumn 1864, Johannes Badrutt had made a bet with six of his English summer guests in the Kulm Hotel: He invited them to be his guests in the winter, and promised them that they would still be able to enjoy the winter sitting on his terrace in the sunshine. If he was wrong, he would also pay the travel costs from London to St. Moritz. The Englishmen travelled home in spring tanned and told “half of England” about their holidays in St. Moritz; winter tourism was launched. Based on this, the year 1864 is considered to be the birth year of winter tourism in Switzerland.

The souvenir trade

The emerging tourist industry often offered the mountain population the only way to earn a few francs on the side. Those who worked in the hotel, restaurant or transport business were lucky to find work. Handicrafts such as carvings, pottery, embroidery and painted vedutas were in demand among the foreigners, and in many places an important trade.