In 2018, the Wengernalp Railway (WAB) together with the Schynige Platte Railway (SPB) celebrated their respective 125th anniversaries of mountain railway. On 10 January 2018, WAB started its anniversary year in its new birthday livery instead of its usual yellow-green livery.
The Wengernalp Railway (German: Wengernalpbahn, WAB) is a 19.11 kilometres (11.87 mi) long rack railway line in Switzerland. It leads along the Kleine Scheidegg mountain pass from Grindelwald and Lauterbrunnen, giving an almost tangible mountain panorama of the Eiger, Mönch and Jungfrau. In winter, it’s the lifeblood of the Jungfrau ski region between Grindelwald and Wengen. To put it simply, the line is normally operated in two sections, with trains from either direction (Grindelwald or Lauterbrunnen) terminating at Kleine Scheidegg. At the latter station, most passengers transfer to the Jungfrau Railway for the continuation of the journey to the highest railway station in Europe at Jungfraujoch.
The WAB measuring from Lauterbrunnen to Grindelwald via Wengen and Kleine Scheidegg is the world's longest continuous rack and pinion railway.
The name Wengernalp refers to the seasonal mountain pastures above Wengen. WAB was opened in June 1893 and was originally launched as a summer railway. Today the WAB operates 365 days a year. The number of visitors on the WAB increased from 37,742 in its founding year to 1,819,932 in 2017. For a round trip, passengers paid CHF 9 in 1893. Today the Lauterbrunen - Kleine Scheidegg - Grindelwald journey costs CHF 61.80 per person.
This postcard (together with another one depicting the Schynige Platte Railway) was issued with 2 stamps by Swiss Post in January 2018. Annina (Postcrossing, 2 July 2018) sent me this great postcard and affixed the two stamps too. Thank you Annina!
On a Personal Note
We went in 2006 to visit the Jungfrau - and we took the WAB up to Kleine Scheidegg where we continued on the Jungfrau Railway. The visit to Jungfrau was a wash-out (a mist-out) unfortunately. The entire resort station was shrouded in mist and we could not see anything,
Wow - happy you like it :-)
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