Wild camping at the Wannisbortsee
A night at the Wannisbortsee is allowed and nobody has to be asked. Nothing at federal, cantonal or communal level forbids it, and at 2'103 metres the lake sits well above the last trees. The Grimsel basin eight kilometres south is a different answer entirely.
What do these mean?
Illegal A specific rule bans it, usually with a fine, and it can be enforced. Sleep somewhere else.
Not allowed No real place to camp here. A gated site, a developed area, or nowhere sensible to lie down, even if no fine is attached.
It depends You can sleep here, but there's a condition first: ask the landowner, book a spot, stay inside a set zone, or use a bivvy instead of a tent. The report says which.
Tolerated No rule clearly allows or bans it, but a single night is accepted in practice and nobody enforces against it. Normal for high bivouacs above the treeline.
Legal Camping one night is fine here. Either a rule allows it, or we checked every law and found nothing against it. Still: pitch late, leave early, no trace.
What is up there, and where the dry ground is
The Wannisbortsee is a small tarn at 2'103.5 metres on the west flank of the Grimsel valley, above Guttannen in the Haslital. It is about 150 by 225 metres of water, roughly 2.4 hectares, and the stream that leaves it is the Hostetbach. Swisstopo writes it Wannisbortsee; you will also see Wannisbordsee, which is how the open map spells it.1
A slope scan run straight at this lake lies to you, so it is worth saying how it was done. The national elevation model renders a water surface as a plane, so the eight flattest cells in a one kilometre box all come back at 0.0 degrees and all eight sit inside the lake. With the water masked, the ground that is actually flat is the shoulder 160 metres north-east: a bench of roughly 50 by 50 metres between 2'126 and 2'129 metres, the best cell at 2'665'853 / 1'170'525, 1.1 degrees, 65 m back from the shore. The aerial shows glacially polished slabs, gravel and grass patches rather than lawn, and there is a damp hollow inside the shelf, so take a grass patch and keep off the wet part.6
If you want to be further from the water, the terrace on the west shore works: 2'665'678 / 1'170'300, 2'130.8 m, 5.0 degrees, 52 m back. Higher and drier again is the bench about 425 metres north at 2'240 m.6
This is above the treeline and off the marked network. The last forest and shrub symbols on the map sit around the 1'900 metre contour near Holzhüs, two hundred metres below the lake, so the basin is open alpine ground with no buildings and no road. The nearest path passes about 147 metres from the water and it is a local mountain path, not part of the signposted national route network.16
Getting there is the honest part of the trip. From the bus stop in Guttannen village at 1'057 metres the lake is 3 kilometres as the crow flies and about 1'050 metres of ascent, roughly three hours, T2, up the west flank beside the Hostetbach. The alp huts of Wiisstanni, Fahrlouwi and Holzhüs are the waypoints. There is no hut and no refuge at the lake. If you want to arrive at dusk rather than in the dark, the local Alpentaxi to Furi takes about 700 metres of that climb off you.9
Nothing forbids it, and here is each level that was checked
A yes is only worth as much as the levels it was checked at, so here they are one by one. Federal, cantonal, communal, and the courts.
Federal: nothing. No game reserve, no BLN landscape, no national park, no floodplain, fen, raised bog, mire landscape, amphibian site, dry meadow, bird reserve, Ramsar or Emerald site and no forest reserve at the point. Those empty answers are answers, because an invalid layer name comes back as an error rather than as an empty list, and the control point inside the Kiental game reserve returns its hit.1
Wildlife rest zones: none here, and this one needs saying carefully. The federal layer is answering rather than blank, because a sweep out to twenty kilometres around this lake returns fourteen Bernese entries, from Grindelwald to the Hasliberg to the Bäregg, and nothing at the Wannisbort. But that layer carries rest zones, and the instrument that actually bans camping in canton Bern is a different one: the cantonal Wildschutzgebiete of the wildlife protection ordinance, which the federal layer does not carry at all. So the zero above settles the rest zones, and the next paragraph settles the other question from the ordinance itself.13
Cantonal: Bern has no general camping ordinance, and what it does have is a list of named wildlife protection areas. Only two of them lie in the Oberhasli wildlife region. Grimsel, number 13, carries three measures: hunting prohibited, dogs on the lead, no civil drones. Kunzentännlen-Hinterstock, number 26, is the same shape with a seasonal hunting rule. Neither says a word about tents, and both perimeters are six to eight kilometres from this lake.3
Communal: Guttannen has no rule to break. The commune publishes thirty-one documents and among them there is no police regulation, no fixed-penalty regulation and no camping regulation. The one communal rule that mentions an overnight stay at all is the visitor's-tax regulation, and it is a tax rule rather than a permission: article 3 makes every paid overnight stay taxable, article 6 collects the tax from the host, and a bivouac has no host.4
The courts: nothing either. Judicial prohibitions in canton Bern are published under their own heading in the cantonal gazette. Guttannen combined with that heading returns nothing, against 593 entries under the heading overall and 392 mentions of Guttannen across all headings, so the filters are doing real work. One honest limit: that register only reaches back to 2020.7
The overlay that is not a camping rule, and the ban that is
Two things sit near this pitch that look like prohibitions and are worth separating, because one of them really is one and it is not the one you are standing in.45
The pitch is inside a communal landscape protection area, and that is a building rule. Article 463 of the Guttannen building regulation, inserted in December 2019, opens on the beauty and integrity of the mountain landscape, and then spends every operative paragraph on construction: existing buildings may be maintained and moved, no new buildings or installations may be erected and no landforms altered, no replacement afforestation, and the exceptions it lists are avalanche works, high-mountain shelters, national telecom installations and the hydro company's plant.4
"Unter Vorbehalt von Absatz 5 dürfen keine neuen Bauten und Anlagen errichtet und keine Veränderungen von Geländeformen wie z.B. Materialabbau und -deponie vorgenommen werden."Baureglement der Einwohnergemeinde Guttannen of 4 December 2010, art. 463 para. 3. In English: subject to paragraph 5, no new buildings or installations may be erected and no changes to landforms such as extraction or deposit may be made.
A tent pitched at dusk and struck at dawn is not a building, not an installation and not a change to a landform. The article carries no camping verb at all, and the penalty behind it, up to CHF 5'000, attaches to breaches of the planning rules. This is the landscape-zone case rather than the nature-reserve case: it restricts what you build and says nothing about where you sleep.4
The real ban is eight kilometres south, and it is emphatic. The cantonal nature reserve Grimsel, the largest in canton Bern, was created by government decree in 1958 and amended in 1974 and 1989, and its paragraph 5 letter f prohibits, in as many words, "the lighting of fires, camping and the pitching of tents". Breaching it is not a fixed-penalty matter: the cantonal nature protection act sets a fine frame of CHF 100 to 50'000, and up to CHF 100'000 in serious cases.5
It really does begin down there and not here. Its perimeter runs from the Berglistock over the Ewigschneehorn and the Bächlistock to the Räterichsboden dam, then along the Grimsel road to the pass and around the Oberaar, and its northernmost anchors sit around 8 kilometres south of the Wannisbortsee. The cadastre says the same thing from the other side: the reserve is listed as a restriction on the hydro company's parcel in the Grimsel basin and as not concerning the parcel this lake sits on.5
One more negative worth having by name, because it is the one that catches alpine pitches elsewhere: there is no groundwater protection zone S1 or S2 anywhere on this parcel, and no cantonal nature reserve, no forest reserve and no protected botanical object either. The cadastre lists all of them as not concerning the parcel, which is a stronger statement than a point miss.4
How to do it right
Nothing here conditions the night, so what follows is courtesy and self-preservation rather than law. Both matter more than usual on this particular approach.
The ground you walk up belongs to the Bäuertgemeinde Guttannen. It is a corporation of about 140 members that owns the alps Wisstanni, Fahrlouwi and Ärlen, which is exactly the line of the ascent, plus 866 hectares of forest. It has published no camping notice of any kind, and its site contains not one occurrence of camping, tent, bivouac or prohibition. You do not need its permission, because no rule conditions the night. Telling it you are coming is simply good manners on worked alp ground.
Bäuertgemeinde Guttannen
info@baeuertgemeinde-guttannen.ch
Barbara Willener, Obfrau · +41 79 252 01 10
Walter Zgraggen, Vizepräsident · +41 79 650 04 40
No fee exists, no tariff is published and no standing arrangement was found, so do not go looking for a price. This is a courtesy call, not a required consent.
The practical hazard on this approach is dogs, not law. The Blattenalp grazing zone is worked with livestock guardian dogs and its edge comes within about 376 metres of the lake. The sheep of the Steinhausalp have been herded since a wolf took a large number of them in the summer of 2022. Walk the marked line, keep your distance from the flock, and do not camp between a guardian dog and its sheep.8
And the honest caveat, because one valley over it already happened. Above Gadmen, an hour over the ridge, an alp corporation put up a board in the summer of 2026 announcing a general camping ban on all its property, and that board changed the answer at the Gadenlouwisee without a single line of public law changing. Nothing of the kind exists at the Wannisbort as far as any register or website shows. But nobody has walked this path for us this season. If you find a board, the board wins, and I would rather hear about it than have you argue with it.58
General rules for wild camping
The rule here gives you the night, so the rest is on you. An absence of prohibition stays an absence for exactly as long as the people using it leave nothing behind, and on this approach there is also livestock to think about.
- No fire. An open fire has no place in the mountains. A gas stove is enough.
- Pitch late, strike early. Set up towards evening, gone again early. A bivouac is one night, not a base camp.
- Leave no rubbish. Everything you carry up you carry down, organic scraps and toilet paper included.
- At least 50 metres from any water for the big business, so you do not foul what people and livestock drink.
- Stay small and quiet. A small group, no speaker, no drone, dogs on the lead, and the alp staff's word goes.
Disclaimer
Everything here is a journalistic assessment as of September 2026, from the sources linked below, and it is not legal advice.
Legal here means a checked absence, level by level, rather than a permission somebody granted. Communal documents change, the Guttannen building regulation dates from 2010 with amendments to 2019, and the cantonal gazette's judicial-prohibition register only reaches back to 2020.
The landowner is the one layer no statute check can pre-empt. A landowner's published, signposted refusal would change this answer even though it carries no fine, and that is exactly what happened at the Gadenlouwisee in June 2026, one valley over.
Follow instructions on site. A genuine emergency bivouac in distress is a separate question from a planned camp. Anyone who spends the night outside bears responsibility for their own conduct and any consequences themselves. Hikebeast, Leon Helg and Saftladen GmbH accept no liability for decisions made on the basis of this text, and call on no one to break applicable law.
Frequently asked questions
Can you legally wild camp at the Wannisbortsee?
Where exactly do I pitch?
Is it also allowed at the Grimselsee and the Oberaarsee?
The pitch is in a landscape protection area. Does that not ban it?
Do I have to tell the landowner?
Leon Helg
Swiss filmmaker and software developer. Spends his free time in the Swiss Alps and maps his favourite spots for Hikebeast. Posts as @leon.helg on Instagram and TikTok.
Sources
- Official federal geodata and the national height model, queried 9 September 2026 at the Wannisbortsee, WGS84 46.681587 N / 8.298081 E, LV95 2'665'753 / 1'170'400, 2'103.5 m, commune Guttannen BE from current-year swissBOUNDARIES3D records. The game-reserve, BLN, national-park, floodplain, fen, raised-bog, mire-landscape, amphibian, dry-meadow, bird-reserve, Ramsar, Emerald and forest-reserve layers all return an empty result set at the point. An invalid-layer control returns HTTP 400 rather than an empty list, and the positive control at 2'626'000 / 1'154'500 returns game reserve no. 3 Kiental. The wildlife-rest-zone layer returns nothing at the point, and that zero carries its own positive control: a 20 km sweep of the same layer returns 118 zones of which 14 are canton Bern, among them Grindelwald Firstweng-Luegenweid, Brienz Balzisschwand, six Hasliberg zones, In Miseren-Seeboden, Hienerstock, Arvenegg, Engstlenwald and Bäregg. That control establishes only that the layer answers for Bern; it does not carry the cantonal Wildschutzgebiete of the WTSchV, which are the instrument that bans camping in this canton and which are resolved separately from the ordinance's own annex, so a zero on this layer is never the whole answer in Bern. The nearest commune boundary is 1'241 m east, across it Innertkirchen. map.geo.admin.ch. ↩
- Canton Bern, cantonal acts read in full from the consolidated PDFs with annexes and term-scanned with per-file controls: Naturschutzgesetz NSchG BSG 426.11, Naturschutzverordnung NSchV BSG 426.111, Gesetz über Jagd und Wildtierschutz JWG BSG 922.11 and the Einführungsgesetz zum Ordnungsbussengesetz BSG 324.1. Zero occurrences of Campieren, Zelt, Biwak, Lagern or Übernachten in any of them, with controls (Gemeinde, Kanton, Busse, Artikel) non-zero in every file, so the zeros are real and not a dead text layer. Canton Bern has no camping or bivouac ordinance of general application. belex.sites.be.ch. ↩
- Verordnung über den Wildtierschutz (WTSchV), BSG 922.63 of 26 February 2003, in force since 1 May 2003, not repealed, read with Anhang 1 (Stand 01.08.2024) and Anhang 2 (Stand 01.12.2024), 195 pages. Canton Bern works with cantonal Wild- und Vogelschutzgebiete listed in Anhang 1 and described sheet by sheet in Anhang 2. Exactly two lie in Wildraum 18, the Oberhasli: Grimsel (Nr. 13), categories A/E/F, whose sheet reads "Kategorie A: Die Jagd ist verboten. Kategorie E: Hunde sind an der Leine zu führen. Kategorie F: Der Betrieb von zivilen, unbemannten Luftfahrzeugen (Modellflugzeuge, Drohnen) ist verboten", and Kunzentännlen-Hinterstock (Nr. 26), categories C/E/F. Neither carries a camping or bivouac ban. The line "Freies/wildes Campieren und Biwakieren sind verboten" does appear in the annex, on 28 other areas, and not one of them is in the Oberhasli. Both perimeters were read off the binding annex maps: Nr. 13 covers the Grimselsee, Oberaar and Unteraargletscher basin with its northern edge around 8 km south of this lake, Nr. 26 sits east of the Grimsel road between Handegg and the Gelmersee, about 6 km south-east. belex.sites.be.ch. ↩
- Einwohnergemeinde Guttannen, the full published collection of 31 regulations, downloaded and read, eight of them without a text layer and therefore OCR'd, with per-file controls non-zero on every one. There is no Polizeireglement, no Ordnungsbussenreglement and no Camping-Reglement, and zero occurrences of Campieren, Zelt, Biwak or Übernachten anywhere in the collection; the single "Camping" hit is "Campingplätze" in the building regulation's natural-hazard article, as an example of a use with evacuation risk. The Baureglement of 4 December 2010, consolidated to 7 December 2019, is the operative instrument. Art. 463 "Landschaftsschutz", inserted 7 December 2019, para. 1: "Das Landschaftsschutzgebiet dient der Erhaltung der grandiosen, weitläufigen Gebirgslandschaft in ihrem natürlich-naturnahen Zustand"; para. 3: "Unter Vorbehalt von Absatz 5 dürfen keine neuen Bauten und Anlagen errichtet und keine Veränderungen von Geländeformen wie z.B. Materialabbau und -deponie vorgenommen werden"; para. 5 permits avalanche protection works, Schutzhütten im Hochgebirge, national telecom installations and the works of Kraftwerke Oberhasli AG. Penalty art. 701 para. 2, Busse bis Fr. 5'000. Kurtaxenreglement, in force 1 June 2021, art. 3 para. 1 makes every paid overnight stay in the commune taxable and art. 6 collects it from the host, at CHF 3.00 per night, with art. 4 lit. h exempting nights in SAC huts. The ÖREB extract for the parcel at the pin, parcel 875, 27.9 km2, carries 70 restrictions of which 64 are Surface geometry and the remaining 6 genuinely Line or Point; point-in-polygon at the pin returns seven, namely the second-home planning zone, the agricultural zone, the synoptic hazard map twice, the landscape protection area, the residual water-protection area "übriger Bereich üB" and a hazard indication. Kantonale Naturschutzgebiete, Grundwasserschutzzonen, Grundwasserschutzareale, Waldreservate, statische Waldgrenzen and geschützte botanische Objekte are all listed as not concerning the whole parcel, so there is no S1 and no S2 anywhere on it. guttannen.ch, Baureglement (PDF). ↩
- Kantonales Naturschutzgebiet Grimsel, NSG-Nr. 5, the largest nature reserve in canton Bern at about 100 km2. Schutzbeschluss RRB Nr. 4590 of 1 August 1958, amended by RRB Nr. 4153 of 30 October 1974 and RRB Nr. 2531 of 31 May 1989. Ziffer 5 lit. f prohibits "das Anzünden von Feuern, Kampieren und das Aufschlagen von Zelten." Sanction under Naturschutzgesetz BSG 426.11 art. 57: para. 1 a fine of CHF 100 to 50'000, para. 2 up to CHF 100'000 in serious cases, para. 3 allows the court to waive punishment in particularly minor cases. The perimeter in Ziffer 3 runs Berglistock, Ankenbälli, Ewigschneehorn, Trifthörner, Hubelhorn, Hühnerstock, Bächlistock, Juchlistock, the Bächlisboden dam, the western shore of the Räterichsboden reservoir, the Grimselstrasse, the Gerstenhörner, the Grimselpass, the Sidelhörner, Löffelhorn, Oberaarhorn, Finsteraarhorn, Lauteraarhorn and Schreckhorn; its northernmost gazetteer anchors sit around N 1'159'000 to 1'162'800, so roughly 8 km south of the Wannisbortsee. Confirmed from the other side with a positive control in the cadastre: the extract for the hydro company's parcel 73 in the Grimsel basin lists "Kantonale Naturschutzgebiete: Grimsel (NSG-Nr. 5)" as a concerned theme, while the extract for parcel 875, on which this lake sits, lists the same theme as not concerned. Schutzbeschluss (PDF), naturschutzgebiete.sites.be.ch. ↩
- Terrain scan with the water masked, 9 September 2026. Slope from the national elevation model on a 25 m grid over a 1 km box, taken row by row from the profile service. Unmasked, the eight flattest cells all read 0.0 degrees at exactly 2'103.5 m and all eight lie inside the lake, which is the tell that the model has rendered the water as a plane. The lake ring was taken from the open map's water polygon, way 1095469829 with 416 nodes, and the surface confirmed against the elevation model as 41 contiguous cells at 2'103.5 m spanning 2'665'678 to 2'665'828 east and 1'170'275 to 1'170'500 north, about 2.4 hectares. Masked, the best ground is the shoulder north-east: 2'665'853 / 1'170'525, 2'126 m, 1.1 degrees, 65 m from the shore, part of a coherent bench of five or six cells between 2'126 and 2'129 m, all under 5 degrees. Alternatives: 2'665'678 / 1'170'300, 2'130.8 m, 5.0 degrees, 52 m back on the west terrace, and a higher bench at 2'240 m about 425 m north. The last forest and shrub symbols on the national map sit around the 1'900 m contour near Holzhüs, 1'929 m, so the basin is above the treeline. map.geo.admin.ch. ↩
- Cantonal gazette of canton Bern, judicial prohibitions under rubric GB-BE, queried 9 September 2026. Keyword Guttannen combined with rubric GB-BE returns 0. The controls that make that zero worth having: the rubric alone returns 593 entries, the keyword alone returns 392 across all rubrics, and an unfiltered call returns 2'838'087 publications, so the filters are doing work rather than being ignored. Named limitation: the digital register only reaches back to 2020, so a judicial prohibition registered before then would not surface here. amtsblatt.be.ch. ↩
- Ownership, livestock and the landowner risk. The Bäuertgemeinde Guttannen, a corporation of about 140 members deciding through its Bäuertversammlung, states on its own site that the alps Wisstanni, Fahrlouwi and Ärlen belong to it and are stocked with cattle and sheep; those are the alps on this ascent. It also owns Alp Handegg, Alp Ägerstein, the Steinhausalp and 866 hectares of forest. Contacts: info@baeuertgemeinde-guttannen.ch, Obfrau Barbara Willener +41 79 252 01 10, Vizepräsident Walter Zgraggen +41 79 650 04 40, Alpkäserei Handegg +41 77 522 60 61. A full-site term scan of the Bäuert's pages returns zero occurrences of campier, camping, Zelt, Biwak or Verbot, against a control of two occurrences of Bäuertversammlung, so it is reading real text. No fee, no tariff and no standing arrangement was found, and none is invented here. Livestock guardian dogs: the federal guardian-dog pasture layer is empty at the lake itself, but the Blattenalp grazing zone with dog presence comes within about 376 m of it. The sheep of the Steinhausalp have been herded by the Sömmerungsgemeinschaft Blatten-Steinhues since a wolf took a large number of them in summer 2022, as reported in the Berner Oberländer in June and September 2023. baeuertgemeinde-guttannen.ch, guttannen.ch. ↩
- Access. Bus stop "Guttannen, Dorf", LV95 2'665'148 / 1'167'410 at 1'057.4 m. The lake is 3.0 km north in a straight line and about 1'050 m of ascent, roughly three hours, graded T2, climbing the west flank beside the Hostetbach through forest switchbacks and out onto open alp past Wiisstanni (hut at 1'492 m), Fahrlouwi (huts at 1'684 m and 1'776 m) and Holzhüs (1'929 m). There is no hut and no refuge at or near the lake; the nearest served ground is the Alpbeizli on Alp Handegg across the valley, +41 77 522 60 61. A path passes within about 147 m of the water and is classified as a Wanderweg in the national topographic model, but the signposted national route network returns nothing at the pin, so it is a local mountain path. Schweizer Wanderwege reports that the local Alpentaxi to Furi saves around 700 m of ascent, operated by Grimseltaxi, which turns a three-hour climb into a short evening walk. On the hydro side, the Hostetbach is inside a water-rights concession, sheet BE-131, Zentrale Innertkirchen I, running to 2042, but the intake sits 1.85 km downstream and 800 m below the lake and no perimeter reaches the pin. schweizer-wanderwege.ch, BAFU residual-flow sheet BE-131 (PDF). ↩