Day 15 Wednesday - A Quick Change of Plans

Swiss Railway Time. The station clock at Montreux has lost most of its minute hand but it still keeps perfect time.

There was quite a storm during the night with much lightning in the mountains. However by breakfast time things had cleared and there was a great view from the hotel over the lake and mountains. 

The MOB narrow gauge runs to Zweisimmen in these swanky trains

Today we went north taking the narrow gauge Montreux Oberland Bahn as far as Zweisimmen. The climb away from the lake at Montreux is always spectacular and the views were incredible. Once over the top of the climb we then went down through heavily forested country with very steep hills. There was a long wait at Montbovon because the train was running ahead of time. 

Our car was practically empty. For a fee passengers can ride in the front while the driver sits in a small cabin above them

The train was pretty much empty and it didn't look as if many tourists are around at present. We were to find them, in spades, later. At Zweisimmen we changed to the BLS train to Speiz. The BLS is standard gauge and equipment for gauge changing has been acquired and will be put into operation this December. The transfer was quite simple for us but for other passengers it was quite a problem bearing in mind some of them had a large number of bags.

The Zweisimmen station cat seems to have lost its tail while crossing the tracks. This is where the gauge changing will take place.

 The BLS took us quickly to Speiz along a pleasant but unspectacular valley. We changed here for a train to Interlaken Ost. 

Our original intention was to go to Murren by taking the train to Lauterbrunnen. However, looking at the train in the platform at Interlaken we decided to go to Meiringen instead. The platform was crowded with Asian tourists, all with enormous suitcases.

Narrow gauge train from Interlaken at Meiringen

The Innertkirchen train arriving at Meiringen

We had originally planned last week to pass through Meiringen and Innertkirchen coming back from the Furka Oberland trip but the inefficiency of that railway caused us to change our plans and cut out Meiringen. At Meiringen we changed to the small train going to Innertkirchen. It was interesting to see the way the platform at Aareschulcht Ost had been improved. As the only train is now longer, the platform had been lengthened and the lighting was much better. From Innertkirchen we came back to Meiringen, then Interlaken and on to Speiz.

The Aareschulcht station platform is now longer. It is located in a tunnel and the lights only come on when a train is there 

This car on exhibition at Innertkirchen announced that the tunnel between there and Goschenen and Andermatt will be started in 2027.

The river Aar is a chalky colour in this area

There was an opportunity at Speiz to see some freight trains.

A BLS 486 is being taken off a freight.

It was replaced by a 465

From Speiz we planned to take a train through the Lotschberg tunnel to Visp and back to Montreux via Martigny. Our train was shown as running four minutes late, then six minutes late. A look at the SBB on-line timetable then said that the train had been cancelled. While trying to find an alternative, it was announced over the platform system and the signal cleared to green. We rode our cancelled train to Visp and made the connection to Montreux.

The ride back was interesting. There was a heavy thunder storm around Aigle but it was dry in Montreux. It seems the storms tend to be forced up the Rhone valley just beyond Montreux but leaving Montreux clear.

There is thunder and lightning up the valley but Montreux is clear.