Aigle-Leysin

Aigle-Leysin train in Aigle. 1988.

The Aigle-Leysin line is a busy route connecting the SBB main line to the ski resort of Leysin, in Vaud. Trains have a familiar livery to British visitors - GWR chocolate and cream!

The first mile or so runs along streets in Aigle (paralleling the ASD but a block or so north) then reverses at Aigle-Depot where it immediately uses rack and pinion. The line is then through vineyards, then through forests before emerging in Leysin, where there are four stations! There is a double track section around Leysin-Feydey, the main Leysin station. There has been talk for years of extending the line to the ski area at Berneuse but nothing's happened yet.

I spent a whole season in Leysin in 1987/88 and we all used the Cog, as it was called locally. It also had an English employee, one of the only ones on the Swiss railway network.