About this journey

Bern station, which opened progressively between 1858 and 1860 and has been rebuilt several times since, serves as the northern anchor of the Lötschberg corridor — the key artery southward toward the Alps and Italy. Services here are operated by both Swiss Federal Railways (SBB) and the Bern-Lötschberg-Simplon railway (BLS), and a RegioExpress runs hourly toward Brig and Domodossola, splitting at Spiez.

The route follows that corridor through the Swiss Alps before crossing into Italy and descending toward Domodossola. Approaching from the Italian side, the line climbs through nine tunnels, including the 2,966-metre-long Varzo Tunnel, built as a spiral to gain height before reaching the Simplon gateway. Below, the final stretch runs approximately 30 km up the Ossola valley to the terminus. Domodossola station itself opened on 9 September 1888, part of a railway project planned since the 1870s to end the valley's isolation. On 1 June 1906, the opening of the Simplon Tunnel and the Brig–Domodossola railway transformed it into an international station. Today it forms a break-of-gauge junction where standard-gauge lines to Milan, Brig, and Novara meet a metre-gauge line to Locarno — a fitting end to a journey that moves from the Swiss Mittelland through Alpine terrain into the northern reaches of the Italian railway network.