Juf is a village in the municipality of Avers

Avers

Avers is a municipality in the district of Hinterrhein in the Swiss canton of Graubünden. It includes Juf, the highest-altitude year-round settlement in Europe.-History:...

 in the canton of Graubünden

Graubünden

Graubünden or Grisons is the largest and easternmost canton of Switzerland. The canton shares borders with the cantons of Ticino, Uri, Glarus and St. Gallen and international borders with Italy, Austria and Liechtenstein...

, Switzerland

Switzerland

Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....

. At 2126 metres (6,975.1 ft) above sea level, it is the highest village with permanent residents in Switzerland and in Europe. Juf has a population of about 24 inhabitants divided over 6 families in a concentrated settlement. They were 20 in 1991 and 30 in 2001. The first inhabitants were immigrant Walser

Walser

The Walser are German-speaking people who live in the Alps of Switzerland, Italy, Liechtenstein and Austria. The Walser people are named after the Wallis , the uppermost Rhône River valley...

 who arrived in 1292.

Heating

Juf differs from settlements in lower valleys in having no trees. Wood was transported for building houses and stables, but dried manure from the inhabitant's animals was burned for a long time instead of wood. Some storages at the sun front of their stables are still visible today. Dried manure contains a lot of energy, produces hardly any smoke and is used all around the globe in areas that lack wood.

Transport

Astonishingly, Juf can be reached by public transport eight times a day all year round, as all post buses running to the high valley of Avers go on to the very end of the road at Juf. It is nevertheless a very remote valley, its infrastructure designed primarily to encourage tourism (two platter lifts for skiing in winter at nearby Juppa), and has been spared the technical installations, such as power lines or tourist resorts, which might otherwise ruin its "pristine beauty". In many ways, it still represents an example of alpine agricultural landscape as it existed in earlier times, even at this remarkable altitude.

Note

Another source gives the title of Europe's highest village to Li Baita, a part of Trepalle

Trepalle

Trepalle is a village in the Italian Alps, a frazione of Livigno, Lombardy. It is considered to be the village located at the highest altitude in Europe...

, Italy — while the Italian Wikipedia gives Trepalle an undisputed number 2 after Juf, probably for its lack of a proper settlement centre.
Just above Juf is an old farmhouse, the Platten-hof, birthplace of writer Johann Rudolf Stoffel. This is considered the highest farmhouse in Europe.

External links

• Village visit is elevating experience swissworld.org