In a self-defeating protest about the negative effects of overtourism, an ancient rock in the Dolomites, in northeastern Italy, has been graffitied with an anti-tourism slogan.
“Tourists Go Home”
The “Tourists Go Home” message was inscribed in upper case letters in permanent black marker on a rock face in the Tre Cime Lavaredo or “three peaks of Lavaredo” area. Discovered by Paralympic Nordic skier Moreno Pesce along a popular trail between the Auronzo and Lavaredo peaks, the graffiti “was not a nice awakening for the Tre Cime” Pesce said in a Facebook post.
As a Venice native, the sportsman must be no stranger to overtourism, but he denounced the way the anti-tourism message had been communicated. “Loving the mountains and sharing a passion is not this,” he argued on the social media post, saying that he valued “good life, but above all good and healthy mountains, different from this one.”
Why are the Dolomites so special?
The three peaks form a UNESCO heritage site, situated in northeastern Italy. Resembling battlements and consisting of the rare mineral dolomite, they are one of the most recognisable mountain groups in the Alps, and have even been adopted as the region’s UNESCO Dolomites Foundation logo. Fossilised Eubrontes dinosaur footprints, discovered in 1992 and dating back between 200 and 250 million years, can be found in the area.
Renowned for climbing, skiing, cycling, hiking and high-octane pursuits such as BASE jumping, para and hang gliding, the Tre Cime area attracts nearly half a million visitors over the four summer months of June to September alone, according to telephone signals measured in the remote area for a 2018 overtourism-focused study, published in Rivista Geografica Italiana.
Betrayed by its own inhabitants?
For several years, discussions have been going on about how to protect the Dolomite trails and mountains from the environmental consequences brought by such high tourist numbers.
What’s more post-pandemic tourism in Italy has surged even further beyond the country’s capacity, creating damage, crowding and countless incidents of antisocial behaviour across the nation’s historic and natural sites. In response, the Italian government is in the throes of introducing new tourist taxes on hotel room prices, on top of regular tourist taxes and targeted taxes in the most popular cities, such as Venice.
But local comments on Pesce’s post blamed the problem on greed, with one going as far as to say that local mountaineers deliberately “attract people of all kinds to make easy money. Total disappointment. The mountain betrayed by its own inhabitants.”
