World of Ships – May 2018

PADDLE STEAMERS

Paddle Steamers I World of Ships I 71

body, and there was a notable Bernese

Oberland success for Vaporama when the

Lake Thun steamer Blumlisalp was brought

back into service after lying idle for over 20

years. The Lake Geneva marine heritage

society, ACPNL, formed a steam section

to draw attention to a fleet dominated by

paddle vessels, and more recently there

was a triumphant return to steam for Lake

Neuchatel paddler Neuchatel, withdrawn in

1969 and used as a restaurant in Neuchatel

harbour from 1972.

LAKE GENEVA

The introduction in 1823 of Lake Geneva’s

first paddle steamer, the 75ft-long Guillaume

Tell, owed a lot to the influence of Edward

Church, the Paris-based American

ambassador to France, who was keen to show

off the steamship invention of his countryman

Robert Fulton. He had a 200-passenger

wooden-hulled vessel built in Bordeaux,

France, with a boiler, engine and paddle

wheels brought in from Great Britain. The

vessel sailed from Geneva to Lausanne’s

lakeside suburb of Ouchy on a the 33-mile trip

that was completed in four hours 30 minutes,

less than half the time the journey then took

by road, although as there were no landing

stages at intermediate stops, passengers and

goods had to be taken ashore in small boats.

The ingenious Mr Church made a net profit

of SwFr55,000 for a season lasting from June

to the end of 1823 and sold the boat for her

building cost of SwFr117,000 before becoming

involved in the establishment of steamer

services on Lake Constance and the Jura lakes

of Neuchatel and Murten. The early years of

steam navigation on Lake Geneva developed

into a tussle between several rival concerns,

but things became more stable from 1873

when Compagnie Generale de Navigation sur

le Lac Leman (CGN), which has survived to

the present day, came into being.

Lake Geneva has around 100 miles of

ABOVE Montreux’s new steam engine came from

her original builders, Sulzer Brothers. (R. Plummer).

shoreline, two fifths of it in French territory.

It is 45 miles in length and up to eight miles

wide, with steamers developed with heavier

construction than those on other Swiss lakes,

and hull characteristics including clipper bows.

While there are daily sailings from Geneva to

the upper lake, most services are on a more

local basis, radiating from Geneva in the Petit

Lac or Lausanne-Ouchy to the Haut Lac resorts

of Vevey and Montreux or directly across

the lake to the French resort of Evian. Since

2011 the remaining paddle vessels have been

recognised as Swiss national monuments.

ABOVE Close to the resort of her name, Montreux is seen following a major renovation completed in 2001.

(Russell Plummer).

Montreux in diesel days between

1962 and 1998. (Russell Plummer).

MONTREUX

BUILT 1904 by Sulzer Brothers, Winterthur

LENGTH 63m, width 7.3m (hull), 14.2m (over paddles)

MACHINERY Compound diagonal by builders; 1962-1988

twin Sulzer diesels powering electric motors; 2001 new

double diagonal engine by Sulzer

SPEED 30kmh (15.5 knots)

PASSENGERS 1,200

Introduced as a steamer in 1904, Montreux

ran with diesel-electric power from 1962

to 1998 before resuming with a new steam

12 Paddlers_Switzerland_NL.indd 71 17/04/2018 12:21