The first pleasant surprise is that you can immerse yourself in the beauty without doing anything, just by standing. Just join your eyes to your heart and eliminate the word “hurry” from your vocabulary for a few hours. And then, with your elbows resting well on the window, careful not to lean out too much, you will naturally enter into the colors and scents of the journey while the hot summer wind ruffles your hair. The dark red of the city station, the thick green of the woods, the smell of damp dirt when you come out of a mountain tunnel: in less than one hundred kilometres, 96 to be exact, you climb from the plain to over a thousand meters and then descend to the sea.
The itinerary begins in Turin Porta Nuova and ends in Imperia, but when we talk about the “Railway of Wonders” we mean the Cuneo-Ventimiglia line, a somewhat daring route that unites Italy and France, connecting the Piedmont plain to the Maritime Alps and the Mercantour National Park until reaching Western Liguria. The name derives from the beauty of the places crossed, but no less fascinating are the architectural solutions used to allow railway passage, such as the Saorge bridge inside the narrow gorges of the Val di Roya or the helical tunnel of Vernante in which the train, so to speak, turns on itself.
The first stop is Cuneo with its medieval porticoes and the majestic Piazza Galimberti, which on days with clear skies offers a suggestive view of Monviso. Just over three quarters of an hour later you reach Limone Piemonte, close to the border with France, in the Maritime Alps, where in summer skiing gives way to hiking, in particular along the Alta Via del Sale, a former military road entirely unpaved.
Half an hour’s journey and here is Tende, 816 meters above sea level in French territoryand here the railway line “finds” its name. At the foot of Mount Bego, considered sacred for millennia, lies the Valley of Wonders with over 35 thousand rock engravings dating back to the Copper and Bronze Ages. At this point you must not take your eyes off the panorama because the stretch that leads to Breil-Sur-Roya offers a very rich range of landscape visions and high engineering solutions.
The train quickly descends in altitude, facing very narrow gorges and vertical rock walls, passing through a long series of bridges and tunnels. In particular, shortly after San Dalmazzo di Tende, you come across the Scarassoui Viaduct with its 42.30 meter bridge suspended in the air to join the two rock walls above the Roya river. From Breil the line leaves the mountain to look out to the Ligurian Sea, initially guided by the course of the Roya river, until reaching Ventimiglia, the final stage of the journey, a city where the charm of the historic center combines with the beauty of the beaches.
To tell the truth, the route still continues towards Sanremo up to Imperia but the line, despite the suggestion of the final locations on which it is almost superfluous to dwell, is no longer the so-called one of wonders. Overall, it takes just over four hours from Turin Porta Nuova to Ventimiglia, while to reach Imperia you need to add half an hour.
The journey is part of “Author’s Itineraries”, a project created by the FS Foundation (Ferrovie dello Stato) to enhance some of its most iconic lines on board historic trains capable of guiding those who board on a journey, also, through time. In fact, it is impossible not to be struck by the “Centoporte” carriages, so called due to the large number of side exits that facilitated the boarding and alighting of passengers. Introduced in the 1920s as sturdy, basic commuter carriages, they were used on some local routes until the late 1980s.
Today, thanks to the recovery work of the FS Foundation, the “Centoporte” carriages have been restored to their original charm with wooden seats and sliding windows that allow you to fully enjoy the landscape. Above the backrest, to testify to the change in customs, next to the signs inviting you not to throw anything out of the windows, there are reproductions of works of sacred art, from the Annunciation to the Last Supper.
A further contribution to the creation of that slow tourism, or slow tourism to put it in English, which invites us to recover the sense of time by responding with the logic of more relaxed rhythms to the frenzy of hit-and-run travel. Itineraries are chosen not only to say “I’ve been there”, but for the pleasure of experiencing the places, breathing in the culture, tasting the flavours. The Railway of Wonders is a full part of this philosophy, it is an invitation to enter into a history of places and relationships that is still very current. It’s a beauty offering that doesn’t ask much to understand. It is enough to simply be there, uniting your eyes and heart in the same gaze.
INFORMATION
The service on the Ferrovia delle Meraviglie includes departures from Turin Porta Nuova at 8.00 am with arrival in Imperia at 12.35 pm every Sunday from 5 July to 16 August. The races on July 26th and August 9th will be brought forward to Saturday July 25th and August 8th. Tickets cost 49 euros for adults and 24.50 for children aged 4 to 12, free under 4s. Info and purchases: www.fondazionefs.it and on Trenitalia sales channels.
