Everyone tells you to see the Alps in summer. We go in September. The cable cars still run on a reduced timetable, the mountain huts have their best cooks in the kitchen, and the meadows have turned from bright green to gold and rust. The light is lower and longer, and you can walk for hours and meet only two or three other people.
In the Soča valley the river is still warm enough for a quick swim after a hike, but the day-trippers have gone. In the Dolomites the popular trails feel like they belong to you again. The larches start to turn, and the whole landscape softens into watercolour.
Shoulder season also changes home swapping. Owners who spent July and August hosting their own families are often ready to get away themselves, so a three-week exchange in early October can come together with one thoughtful email. You arrive to a house that has been aired, a garden either put to bed or still pushing out late tomatoes, and a note with the name of the woman who keeps the keys.
The practical difference is large. Restaurants have tables. Parking is easy. The small valley museums are open and the staff want to talk. You cook more, because the markets are for locals again. We have gone back to the same two valleys for seven years now, always the same two weeks of September, and the neighbours know us. That kind of belonging is impossible in high season.