SWITZERLAND // Nature is left to its own thrilling devices in the remote and ruggedly mountainous Swiss National Park. The first national park to be established in the Alps - and still the only one in Switzerland - it stays true to its original conservation ethos: no trees are felled, no meadows cut, no animals hunted. The result is a spirit-lifting, Eden-like space of larch forests, jagged peaks and lake-lapped meadows that is home to ibex, chamois, marmots and recently reintroduced bearded vultures.

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