The Glacier Express climbs through snow to skifields in Switzerland. Photo / 123rf
The Glacier Express climbs through snow to skifields in Switzerland. Photo / 123rf
If you thought European opera was dramatic, think again. It’s the railroads that offer the most thrilling, breathtaking and climatic experience of all, writes Ewan McDonald.
Slower than a speeding bullet train, powerful as their locomotives allow and able to leap tall mountains with a single ticket, Europe’s most scenic railways allow travellers to enjoy the continent’s sights and delights from a window seat.
And just to make you feel truly righteous, they’re safer, more comfortable and much more environmentally friendly than most other ways of getting around. Here are five of the best.
The “Iron Road to the Isles” links Glasgow and the Highlands port of Mallaig. One of the most photogenic trips, it’s starred in Harry Potter, Local Hero and, perhaps predictably, Trainspotting. It’ll take you places you can see only from the train: no roads here.
Leaving Glasgow, it heads west along the River Clyde and past Loch Lomond, turning north into deep forests, heather-studded moors, towering mountains and steep-sided, mirrored lochs. The line to Mallaig begins with the Horseshoe Curve entering, circling and leaving the glen beneath Ben Dorain, then crosses broad, wild Rannoch Moor.
It passes Corrour, the UK’s highest station, and pushes on to Fort William, below Ben Nevis, Britain’s highest peak; crosses majestic Glenfinnan Viaduct to . . . not Hogwarts but the shore and past the isle of Skye.
For the ultimate experience, book the Jacobite Steam Train (aka Hogwarts Express) from Fort William or the luxurious Royal Scotsman rather than the everyday Scotrail train.
Cross majestic Glenfinnan Viaduct en route to Mallaig in Scotland. Photo / 123rf
Northern Exposure
Bergen Railway, Norway
Oslo to Bergen via Flam (550km, 7 hours)
You pays your money and you takes your choice: cruise the coast and appreciate (literally) awesome fiords and islands from the sea, or enjoy the sights from the warmth of a first-class carriage.
Northern Europe’s highest mainline railway is so beautiful that all seven hours were telecast in 2009 as the first-ever Slow TV programme. Bookended by two beautiful cities, the line rolls from regal Oslo through craggy mountain passes and lakes, past pine forests, glittering lakes, valleys splashed with colourful flower meadows in spring and autumn, and on to gorgeous Bergen.
At Myrdal, sidestep to the branch line to Flam (20km, 1 hour). The world’s steepest rail line plunges 867m in those few clicks, providing vistas of the fiord, mountains, lakes and myriad waterfalls, including 93m Kjosfossen.
Enjoy the mountainous landscape on the route between Myrdal and Flam in Norway. Photo / 123rf
Day of wine and castles
West Rhine Valley Railway, Germany
Cologne to Mainz (152km, 2½ hours)
You can take a high-speed train or inter-city express and knock this trip off in less than an hour. Better to make a day of it and ride the local (clears throat) Mittelrheinbahn RB26 stopper service. It chugs along the riverbank in 90 minutes, past the white-water narrows where Lorelei’s siren song lured sailors on to rocks and inspired Wagner’s music, swirling waters and cliffs that inspired JMW Turner’s paintings, and fairytale castles that inspired Disney’s cartoons.
And you will want to break the “journey” in any number of romantic, old-world villages for a riesling or gewürztraminer from the vines on precipitous 130m-high clifftop terraces.
Pressed for time, you could confine your visit to the 65km section between Bingen and Koblenz, forming the Rhine Gorge Unesco World Heritage Site. You’ll see the greatest hits in less than an hour, cruising to the junction of two mighty rivers – the Rhine and Moselle – at imperial, medieval Koblenz, guarded by even mightier fortresses and palaces.
The Hohenzollern railway bridge in Cologne, Germany. Photo / 123rf
Feat on the ground
Semmering Railway, Austria
Gloggnitz to Mürzzuschlag (41km, 45 minutes)
Strangely, the subject of sniffy TripAdvisor reviews. Trust Unesco, which declared this a World Heritage Site, “one of the world’s great feats of civil engineering”, the pioneering mountain railways created by 20,000 workers from 1848-54.
The route through Austria’s eastern Alps boasts 16 viaducts, 15 tunnels, more than 100 stone-arch and iron bridges and countless hairpin bends in its 42km route to and across the 965m-high Semmering Pass.
Rails teeter on double-decker viaducts above jaw-dropping valleys – acrophobes, beware - and through narrow passes, at a pace allowing swoon-inducing views of the mountainscape.
The journey begins at Gloggnitz, 436m above sea level, and ends at Murzzuschlag, 677m up. The last section is the most dramatic as the train grinds and groans and twists through the alps and the 1431m Semmering Tunnel, then descending along the Roschnitz valley.
Even while it was being built, the Semmering railway was perceived as “landscape gardening” - a harmonious combination of technology and nature. The journey opened the region for tourism, and today it’s one of Austria’s most famous winter sports destinations.
Take the elevated railroad between Gloggnitz (pictured) to Muzzuschlag in Austria. Photo / Getty Images
Upwardly mobile
Glacier Express, Switzerland
Zermatt to St Moritz (291km, 7½ hours)
Switzerland means Toblerone, a numbered bank account – and the country’s famously photogenic railway lines, red-and-silver trains gliding along alpine valleys or climbing through snow to ski fields and apres-ski bars. The Glacier Express cuts through the Alps via 291 bridges and 91 tunnels, another Unesco world heritage site.
Ignore “express”: the luxe train takes nearly eight hours to travel less than 300km at an average 38km/h. Well, that allows plenty of time to sip a wine and gaze out the panoramic windows at snow-capped peaks, rugged valleys, mountain meadows of impossible green pasture, multi-coloured flowers, and cowbelled herds.
If this is not enough of a high-end experience, take Europe’s highest cog railway from Zermatt to Gornergrat summit (3089m) for a view of the Matterhorn. The mountain that used to be on the Toblerone package.
The Glacier Express cuts through the Alps via 291 bridges and 91 tunnels. Photo / Getty Images
