Dictionary
Words, grammatical forms and meanings linked to the ontology.
alpine divorce en · NOUN
Meanings
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(countable, informal, uncountable) The situation where an individual is abandoned by their romantic partner during hiking, climbing or mountaineering, mainly due to an argument.
On social media, women describe alpine divorce as going on a hike, climb or other outdoor adventure with a male partner, only to be abandoned or left behind – perhaps he went too fast and neglected to wait, or a fight on the trail resulted in him storming off. Breakups have quickly followed. […] Others flooded the comments section with stories about being served with an alpine divorce. One woman described a 12-hour journey out of the Grand Canyon after her boyfriend ditched her, during which she was assisted by a “very nice man from Norway” who carried her backpack. […] That said, many alpine divorces do not happen because a man has ill intentions.
2026 March 17, Alaina Demopoulos, “Women are being abandoned by their partners on hiking trails. What’s behind ‘alpine divorce’?”, in The Guardian, →ISSN, archived from the original on 27 Mar 2026:
Forms
Relateds
sleep divorce