Les Mosses → Château-d'Oex

A stage that heads down to the Sarine

You start at 1,444 m in Les Mosses and finish at 968 m in Château-d'Oex. In between are 15.4 km, plus 400 m of climbing and 880 m of descent according to SwitzerlandMobility. SwitzerlandMobility allows 4 h 15 of walking in this direction and 4 h 40 the other way, and rates the stage medium for fitness as well as for technique.

At the start you'll find Le Bivouac, Bar le cosmos and La Drosera. Halfway along there's a water point. After that, for food you have to wait until Les Moulins: the Pizzeria de la Croix d'or and the Early Beck café. On the way, follow the signposts and check the conditions on the day.

From Les Mosses to Les Moulins

The path leaves the Col des Mosses and reaches its high point, 1,498 m, in the first few kilometres. It dips to cross the Hongrin, climbs back to La Lécherette, then gains height again until around the sixth kilometre.

Then, around halfway, comes the long descent down towards the Sarine. The path passes the Torrent des Coulayes, Le Monteiller Devant, the Torneresse and Les Moulins. It crosses the Sarine, then climbs through Le Pré and La Frasse to Château-d'Oex.

A moorland of national importance

In its first seven kilometres, the path runs through the Col des Mosses/La Lécherette moorland, listed in 1996 in the Federal Inventory of Mire Landscapes of Particular Beauty and National Importance (site 99). Flysch and impermeable moraine deposits created the gentle shapes of the relief and the wide expanses of marsh: six raised bogs and hundreds of hectares of fens stretch across the site.

After La Lécherette, the path passes through the raised bog "Tourbière sous les Plans", listed in the Federal Inventory of Raised Bogs. The Hongrin, with its riverside vegetation and meanders, is one of the valuable natural streams here, and the mosaic of wetlands, meadows and pastures is highly valuable for wildlife, especially for certain birds, butterflies, dragonflies, reptiles and amphibians. Part of the fens and wet meadows is mown for fodder and litter; scattered hay barns recall this practice.

Château-d'Oex, from the Counts of Gruyère to Bern

Château-d'Oex is a large village in the upper Sarine valley, with the villages of L'Etivaz, Les Moulins and Les Granges. From the 14th to the 18th century, the municipality was divided into seven "établées", including Le Monteiller and La Frasse. The Counts of Gruyère conquered the valley from the 10th century. The church, dedicated to Saint Donatus and mentioned from 1175, was rebuilt in the early 14th century on the hill of La Motte, the site of a castrum belonging to the Count of Gruyère.

Bern received the upper Gruyère region in 1555. In the 18th century, a community of 2,000 people and 2,000 cows sold its cheeses at the market in Vevey, reached over the Col de Jaman. In 1800, a great fire destroyed the wooden houses built on the central hill, and the village was rebuilt in stone.

Arriving in Château-d'Oex

The Col des Mosses road was built from 1865 to 1871. In 1904, the arrival of the Montreux-Oberland Bernois (MOB) railway made the municipality more attractive as a holiday resort, popular with British tourists. At the finish is Château-d'Oex station: the rest of this page gives the next departures.