About this journey

Landquart station sits at the entrance to the Prättigau valley, where the Rhaetian Railway's metre-gauge network begins its climb into the Grisons Alps. The line owes its existence to Willem Jan Holsboer, a Dutch hotelier who proposed a railway to Davos in 1888, reasoning that a rail connection would draw far more visitors than horse-drawn carriages. He initially planned a standard-gauge route, but mountainous terrain made that too costly, and a ground-breaking ceremony for a narrow metre-gauge line took place on 29 June 1888. The line reached Klosters by 1889 and the full route to Davos opened on 21 July 1890. In 1895, Holsboer renamed his company the Rhaetian Railway to reflect wider ambitions for the network.

The first 15 to 20 km out of Landquart are the line's fastest section, approved for speeds of up to 90 km/h. Beyond Malans, the route passes through the 984 m Chlus Tunnel, which has bypassed a narrow ravine since 1963. The climb steepens between Küblis and Klosters, where gradients reach up to 4.4%, and above Klosters the line negotiates two horseshoe curves through the 402 m Klosters curved tunnel and the 334 m Cavadürli curved tunnel, with the steepest gradient on the whole line at 4.5%. From the high point at Davos Wolfgang, the line descends alongside Lake Davos through Davos Dorf before arriving at Davos Platz.