A Spectacular Train Journey into Switzerland's Rural Canton of Obwalden

Headed for the Heart of Switzerland

Looking up the Obwalden valley at Lungernersee and the Alps

If you had asked me to point to the Canton of Obwalden on a map before I visited, I don’t think I could have done it. To level with you, I still might just circle my finger around the cluster of Cantons in the center of Switzerland, the borders of which are all just a bit too complicated to keep track of.

Most of the small half-canton of Obwalden is smushed into a single glacial valley that breaks off from Vierwaldstädtersee and finds its terminus high up in the Alps and at Brünig Pass, the boundary with the Canton of Bern. Just one valley over to the south, separated by quite large mountains, lies Nidwalden, the other half of the canton, and Engelberg, a large exclave of Obwalden.

The border region between Obwalden and Nidwalden is known for its spectacular summer hiking but lingering snow more or less ruled that out on our latest visit.

Alternatively, we set our sights on the main valley bottom, touring the town of Lungern, walking most of the way around Lungernersee, and visiting the Cantonal capital of Sarnen. All these adventures were tied together by one of the most spectacular rail trips in all of Switzerland.

If you are looking for the rural core of the country, a place where gruff farmers growl at you as you walk past, subtle history is on display around every bend, and views go on for days, then this may be the Canton for you.

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Over Brünig Pass and Into Obwalden

As impressive as the route is to this point, it only gets better as the train reverses direction out of Meiringen headed for Brünig Pass, straight up the mountain on the northern side of the valley. To make it up the incredibly steep grade up to the pass, the train needs to engage a similar rack and pinion system to the Berner Oberland Bahn that we rode on our way up to Lauterbrunnen and the Jungfrau Region several weeks back.

The views back down the valley towards Meiringen are unbelievable on a clear day. To make sure you get the best views for the entire trip, sit on the right side of the train headed from Interlaken and whatever you do, don’t give that seat up until you get where you are going. Despite the train's reverse in Meiringen, the best views in the direction of Lucerne always seem to stay on this same side of the train.

When you peak out at the Brünig Pass about 10 minutes after leaving Meiringen, you have risen nearly 400 meters (1300 ft)! From Brünig, you cross over into the Canton of Obwalden and the train drops down into the valley nearly as quickly as it came up.

When Lungernersee, or Lake Lungern, and the huge Lungern church finally come into view far down in the valley below, it is quite the sight to behold.

If you want to get to Obwalden from pretty much anywhere in Switzerland, there is really only one option you should seriously consider, the Luzern to Interlaken Express. While this Panorama Express line is far overshadowed by more popular routes like the Glacier Express and the Golden Pass Express, it offers incredible views as well as the fastest way to get to Obwalden from Interlaken, in the Berner Oberland.

As an aside for visitors to Switzerland, particularly if you will be flying into Zurich and intend to head to the Berner Oberland. SBB, Switzerland’s national rail carrier, will typically tell you that the fastest way to get to Interlaken from Zürich is through Bern on the IC8 or IC81 and they are not wrong, this is the FASTEST way to get to Interlaken but not the most scenic. Sure, parts of the trip are lovely but most of the time you will just be blasting through the Swiss plateau, the agricultural center of Switzerland.

For the price of an hour of your time and a bit of scurrying to catch the connection in Lucerne, you can take the far, far more scenic Panorama Express line the rest of the way to Interlaken. The best part is, because the distance isn’t as far, you actually save money by taking this route. In my opinion, the views are 110% worth the minor extra effort if you are on vacation!

Back to our trip. From Interlaken, the Luzern to Interlaken Express heads along the northern shores of Lake Brienz through Ringgenberg where we walked a few months ago, and past the town of Brienz at the end of the lake on its way up the valley to Meiringen. Along the way, you pass some of the world’s most incredible waterfalls tumbling down the steep valley walls.

Looking down into Obwalden from the Panorama Express

Five Churches, a Lake, and a Waterfall

More from the Panorama Express in a bit but the small town of Lungern is our first stop.

A generally informative and professionally made, but quite challenging to follow, audio guide from the local tourism board led us around the town and its surroundings. First mentioned in the 13th century, Lungern, high in the upper Obwalden valley, was relatively difficult to access until the construction of the Brünig Pass road in 1861 and the rail line in 1888.

Around the same time in 1887, a devastating flood from the tiny Eibach river running through Lungern badly damaged much of the town including its main church, our first stop in Lungern.

The Bell Tower of the old Lungern Church

Today all that is left of the old Lungern Church is its bell tower. The rest of the church and its Beinhaus (filled with skeletons just like what we encountered a few weeks ago in Leuk), were washed away and buried in mud and debris.

A staircase in the tower takes you up to a nice view over Lungernersee and gives you a good perspective on the landscape. Desperately trying to scrape the thought of thousands of skulls washing down the hill out of our minds, we gave the old bells a ring (the audio guide told us to) and headed down to the lake shore.

Over the winter and early spring, the water level in Lungernersee stays far below its high point leaving islands high and dry within the lake bottom. This drawdown occurs as water is released from the dam at the end of the lake to produce hydroelectric power for winter heating. In the Spring and early Summer, the lake level rises back up with snowmelt.

Looking out on Lungernersee from the old church tower

Interestingly, at the end of the 18th century, the decision was made to, with much effort, drain the natural lake entirely to make way for more agricultural land. A mere 80 years later, with the introduction of electricity, the political tides shifted and the newly built dam drowned the farms on the lake bottom.

After contouring the lake shore for a while we worked our way back uphill to a 17th-century chapel near the main town of Lungern. This chapel narrowly escaped demolition with the expansion of the modern Brünig Pass road but otherwise offered little to write home about. From there, we moved on to the much more impressive modern Parish Church of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

This massive neo-gothic church along with its terraced cemetery, both opened in 1893 as the replacement for the destroyed church on the edge of town, sits on a saddle between the town of Lungern and the Brünig Pass road. Its sheer size is completely out of proportion in this rural community of c. 2000 residents. The church would look more commonplace in the heart of urban Zurich or Geneva than here, but it was the desire of the town to create a structure that made a statement to passersbys on the pass road. That it certainly does.

While there isn’t much to look at in the church, the views from its terrace are sweeping and provide a nice overview of the upper valley, the next church on our tour, Chapel Obsee, and Dundelbachfall off in the distance.

The new Lungern Parish Church of the Sacred Heart of Jesus on the hill above the Brünig pass road

Views over the upper valley from near the new Lungern Church.

Of the churches in Lungern, Chapel Obsee may be the most interesting. After the reformation, the Beatus Cave along the shores of Lake Thun in the Berner Oberland became inaccessible to the many catholic pilgrims from Unterwalden (the formerly unified cantons of Obwalden and Nidwalden) who visited the site. In exchange, this small chapel was built at the end of the 17th Century in honor of Saint Beat, an Irish monk who (supposedly) slayed a dragon in the Beatus Cave. Beat and his dragon are on full display in the fanciful baroque altarpiece in the chapel.

From Obsee we headed for the northern valley wall and the lovely 150 m (c. 500 ft) Dundelbachfall before following the fairly busy path around Lungernsee. It was a bit surprising to see as many people out walking on this path as we did. The walk is mostly exposed to direct sun and, with the drawn-down lake, the water is fairly far below. The views are nice, and while I think it would make for a lovely bike ride, I would save your walking efforts for elsewhere.

The altarpiece in Chapel Obsee depicting Beatus and his dragon.

Looking up at Dundelbachfall outside of Lungern

The small Burglen Chapel near the far end of the lake marked our fifth church of the day. Though not particularly exciting to look at on the interior, or very large, we quickly found that the building had a natural echo and unbelievable acoustics that led us to linger for quite a while.

Back on the path we decided to scrap our plans to make a full circle of the lake and instead ended on a high note in the hamlet of Kaiserstuhl with exceptional views of the Alps up the lake. We caught the Panorama Express and continued down the valley.

To the Cantonal Capital of Sarnen

Looking down on the lower Obwalden valley from the Panorama Express line.

When you look at a map or an aerial image of Obwalden, it’s almost impossible to see how much elevation difference there is between Lungern and Sarnen, the capital of the Canton down in the lower valley. As the train trundles out of Kaiserstuhl, you go through some unbelievably narrow cuts that nearly touch the sides of the train on both sides, then drop precipitously nearly 220 meters (700 ft) down towards the lower valley and the Sarnersee.

Some incredible views make way to the shores of the Sarnersee, or Lake Sarnen. This valley has ample evidence of occupation as far back as the Bronze age, around 2000 BC but we know that people have been here much longer. A stone knife found near Lungern dates to around 7000 BC and several other neolithic sites have been unearthed in the region. We made our last stop of the day in the town of Sarnen with its cute town center which has served as a hub of activity in Obwalden for centuries.

Over time, the Romans and then the Allemani moved into Obwalden changing the cultural landscape and, by the early Middle Ages, the lands had started to take their current political shape. Together, Obwalden and Nidwalden formed the lands of Unterwalden. Traditionally ruled over by minor nobles, the purchase of Unterwalden by the Habsburg’s in the 13th Century spelled an end to centuries of relative freedom and spurred a military alliance with the lands of Uri and Schwyz. Together, the three Cantons formed the Eternal Alliance in 1291, considered by most the beginning of modern Switzerland.

From here, the history of Obwalden gets incredibly complicated, wrapped up in the wars and conquests of the Confederates. In the 14th and 15th Century, Obwalden took on increasing political independence from the rest of the canton leading to the generally amicable division into two half-cantons. With the invasion of France in 1798, Obwalden was reassembled with Nidwalden and the Canton of Uri into the short-lived Canton of Waldstätten that was itself dissolved with the fall of the Helvetic Republic in 1803.

With the formation of the modern Swiss Confederation and constitution in the early 19th Century, Obwalden gained the independence of a full canton with half representation at the federal level that persists today.

The old town of Sarnen, Capital of the Canton of Obwalden

Back in Sarnen, we tromped up the road to Landenberg on the hill above the old town passing the Hexenturm, or witches tower, one of the few castles still around from the founding of the Swiss Confederation. In the 11th to 13th century Landenberg was once one of the most complex castle sites in the region. Today the location features only trace remnants of the old castle walls. In the 18th century, the fanciful Schützenhaus and armory, still standing today, were built on top of the ruins. This site served as the location of the annual Landsgemeinde until is dissolution in 1998.

If you read our post on Appenzell, you already know about the Landesgemeinde, the most Swiss of political traditions which remains on display there to this day. You can check out that post for more details but the short version is as such: each year, every eligible man in the Canton comes out to vote in public by a show of hands that sees direct democracy in its purest form. Unfortunately, the system is not very efficient. With growing populations, it has become a thing of the past in most of Switzerland. Since the dissolution of the Landesgemeinde here in Obwalden, the site has served as a park and event venue with stunning views up into the Alps dividing Obwalden from Nidwalden.

The armory at Landenberg just on the hill above the old town of Sarnen

With the Landenberg as our high point, we were quite content to make our way back down into town to grab a drink before catching the train back to the Berner Oberland the same way we had come. The views on the return were just as lovely as on the way to Obwalden and I wouldn't hesitate to jump on this train again just for the fun of the ride.

We hope you enjoyed hearing about our visit to the Canton of Obwalden. If you enjoyed this week’s visit, check out the other articles in our series One Year: 26 Cantons where we visit all 26 of Switzerland’s Cantons in 2024. Stay tuned for additional articles on our Swiss travels every week!

Until next time, gute Reise, and feel free to leave a comment on one of our social media platforms!

Views of the old town of Sarnen and the Alps from Landenberg