1. As I am looking at this Synoptic Map of Switzerland for the Swiss pass, there are continuous red train lines, red dotted lines (lines with discounts) and then red dashed lines. Are the dashed lines discounted routes? ie from Reichenbach to Raron (between Spiez and the Visp/Brig area) 2. And for the route above if it's discounted, would you have to buy a separate discounted ticket for that particular section if we are going from Spiez to Zermatt? 3. On the Eurail map, there is a main line from Spiez to Brig but not on the Swiss map. Are those two separate train lines that are participating in just one of the passes? Thanks!
Posted by
Seattle, WA
17165 posts
Great questions! The red dashed lines indicate tunnels. As far as pass coverage, they are the same as solid red linesfully covered with a Swiss pass. If you look carefully in the area between Spiez and Brig, you will see there are two routes. The older one, shown faintly on the map, stops at kandersteg and then enters the Lötschberg tunnel, and then makes a big switchback to descend to Brig. The newer route goes through the Lötschberg Basistunnel, which is a longer, deeper tunnel that eliminates the slow switchbacks on the other route. It substantially cut down the time of travel from, say, zurich to Zermatt. This is the darker line that goes to Vsip, and then to Brig. I don't know which one your Eurail map depicts, but I would think both would be covered by a Eurail pass. They are both definitely covered by a Swiss pass.
Posted by
Seattle, WA
17165 posts
Just to add---the IC trains between Spiez and Brig (heading to Milan) use the Basistunnel to Visp. This is the faster way to Zermatt. To go by way of the other route, you have to catch a regional train going to Kandersteg. It takes longer, but you don't spend as much time in a long tunnel (although there still is one).
Posted by
OP
Bolivar
15 posts
Perfect! Thanks so much!