Customs Thousands of Räbeliechtli light up the night in Richterswil ZH
Countless Räbeliechtli lit up the night in Richterswil on Saturday evening. Thousands of visitors flocked to the municipality on Lake Zurich to marvel at the largest Räbelichtli parade in the country.
08.11.2025, 20:54
08.11.2025, 20:55
SDA
Schools and clubs from Richterswil and Samstagern created over 45 different designs. In order to better distribute the crowds, there were two different starting points for the parade for the first time. Visitors were also asked to leave their baby carriages at home "due to the limited space".
The Räbechilbi, as the event is also known, looks back on a long tradition. Churchgoers who lit the way to the evening service with Räbenlichtern were the role models for today's major event.
In the Guinness Book of Records
Teachers from the local school organized the first parades. According to oral tradition, it was the teacher Ulrich Baumann who formed the young people with their individual Räben into a procession around 1860, as stated on the tourist office's website.
From 1905, the tourist office took over the organization. In 1999, the Räbechilbi was entered in the Guinness Book of Records on the initiative of three schoolchildren. "On 14 November 1998, the people of Richterswil-Samstagern organized a Räbechilbi, a procession of lights, with 24 tons of hollowed-out autumn turnips and 40,000 candles," it said in the Book of Records at the time.
