Schynige Platte and its Alpine Garden

The line from Wilderswil opened in 1893 and has changed little since: small brown carriages, a rack between the rails and about an hour of climbing through forest and then open meadow to a ridge at roughly two thousand metres. What waits at the top is a garden rather than a summit. The alpine garden was laid out in the 1920s on the slope beside the station and grows several hundred species of Swiss mountain plants in beds arranged by habitat, each labelled, with gentians, saxifrages and edelweiss among them. Behind the beds the ground falls to Lake Thun and Lake Brienz on one side and rises to the Eiger, Mönch and Jungfrau on the other.

What you actually see

• The alpine garden - several hundred labelled mountain species in beds set out by habitat.
• The 1893 railway - wooden carriages and an hour of rack and pinion climbing.
• The Panoramaweg - a loop of about two hours along the ridge above the garden.
• The two lakes - Thun and Brienz seen together from the edge of the ridge.

When to go

The railway runs from late May to late October and is shut the rest of the year. Flowering peaks from late June into July, which is also the busiest stretch; by September the beds are past their best but the light is better and the ridge is quiet. Go up on the first train and walk before the day trips arrive.

Honest expectations

Everything depends on the train, and the last one down is early; miss it and the walk to the valley is long and steep. The fare is high for a short line, and rail passes discount rather than cover it. The garden is small and half an hour walks it. In cloud the ridge offers flowers, wind and nothing else.

Nearby

Interlaken and Wilderswil below, with Grindelwald and the Lauterbrunnen valley beyond.