Wattinger Kurve (Wattingen Curve)

Wattingen is a small hamlet on the west slope of the Reuss valley, below the village of Wassen, at approximately 910 m (2,985 ft). The Gotthard mountain line reaches it at the lowest level of the famous Wassen double loop: coming up the valley, the tracks curve around the hamlet and disappear into the Wattinger spiral tunnel, a 1,084 m (3,556 ft) bore completed in 1882 that turns the line back north to gain height. The standing point used here, taken from a geotagged photograph captioned "the most famous railfanning spot on the Gotthard line" on Wikimedia Commons, is approximately 160 m (525 ft) east of the tracks at the curve.

A visit is built around the timetable. The regular train is the SOB Treno Gottardo, hourly in each direction, with occasional diverted freight when the base tunnel is closed. Arrive a few minutes before a Treno Gottardo is due, and use the gap to reposition: from the hamlet a train can be followed on the curve, over the river bridges and into the tunnel portal.

This is a different place from the Wassen church view. The parish church, whose tower appears three times to passengers climbing the loop, is approximately 960 m (0.6 mi) north-north-east and is not part of this view: Wattingen shows the curve, the bridges and the tunnel mouth at the bottom of the loop.

The valley here is narrow and steep, with forested slopes rising toward the Rienzenstock above the hamlet. The river runs in its bed below the line, and the A2 motorway crosses the valley on a viaduct nearby, so road noise is part of the atmosphere. Wattingen itself is a few houses and a chapel, where the waymarked Gottardo-Wanderweg passes beneath the railway.

The double-track line, with its catenary and stone structures from the 1880s, sits low on the hillside, which is what makes the curve readable from below: a whole train can be seen bending around the slope before it enters the mountain.

Being in a deep north-south valley, the curve loses direct sun early on winter afternoons behind the western ridge.

The Gotthard line opened in 1882 and was the great north-south railway through the Alps. On the north ramp it gains height through a series of spiral tunnels, and at Wassen through a double loop with two spiral tunnels, the Wattinger tunnel and the Leggistein tunnel. The tracks cross the Meienreuss three times; the lowest bridge lies below the village church of Wassen, the upper one approximately 200 m higher. The Wattinger tunnel loops around the hamlet of Wattingen on the west slope of the valley and creates a south-facing turn over the Reuss, after which the line climbs north again past Wassen station on the middle level.

The double loop at Wassen was kept from the first route design when the chief engineer Wilhelm Konrad Hellwag and his team drew up the final alignment of the mountain line. The line was electrified from 1916, powered by the railway's own hydroelectric plants at Ritom and Amsteg. After the Gotthard Base Tunnel opened in 2016, the mountain line was retained as a diversion route and for regional and tourist traffic.

Wattingen shows the Wassen double loop from its lowest level: curve, river bridges and a spiral tunnel portal together, without the church that most visitors come to see from the village. It is also unusually easy to reach: Wassen station, on the line's middle level, is approximately 350 m (1,150 ft) from the standing point, and the official Gottardo-Wanderweg footpath runs through the hamlet. Wikimedia Commons describes it as the most famous railfanning spot on the Gotthard line.