July 2, 2012
Taking to the rails: Tiefencastel - Tirano (Italy)
I WON'T KEEP YOU long with this because we hardly rode a bike at all today. But we feel no regrets. Because there is a railway from Tiefencastel to the Italian border at Tirano that is one of the most beautiful and extraordinary in the world.
The Albula Railway is a metre-wide line through spiral tunnels, that turns repeatedly back on itself like a rising glider and now and then crosses entire valleys on spindly bridges. Between the neighbouring stations of Bergun and Preda, for instance - just 6.5km in a straight line - the railway runs more than 18km because of the three spiral tunnels, two curved tunnels and all the bridges.
In all, on 62km of track there are 55 bridges and 39 tunnels. Time and again the line turns back on itself on a radius of just 100m, the wheels squealing on the rails. It is just as it was built in 1898 and it runs through some of the most beautiful countryside in the world.
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