The grande dame of the Pyrenees

Canfranc station in the Spanish Pyrenees was built as a 241‑metre palace for international trains between France and Spain – a “grande dame” of the mountains in a village of barely 600 people. During the Second World War this cross-border line became a knot of gold-for-wolfram deals, spies and escape routes for Jewish refugees and resistance fighters.

“Bigger than the Titanic!” once flaunted on tourist posters. Others called it La Grande Dame des Pyrénées. At the beginning of the 20th century, during the heyday of European railways, the 241-metre-long Art Nouveau palace, with no fewer than 150 entrance gates and more than 350 windows in an area of 9,000 square meters, would not have looked out of place in capital cities like Vienna or Paris. What is such a colossal railway station – the second largest in Europe after Leipzig’s – doing in the middle of the Pyrenees, in a Spanish mountain village with 600 inhabitants?

The Pau – Canfranc railway line was one of the four rail links between France and Spain. At the end of the 19th century, Spain and France agreed on this route across the Pyrenees. From Pau, you travel via Bedous to Canfranc, before continuing to Zaragoza. For this project, the river Aragón was diverted and dozens of tunnels, bridges and viaducts were built, including the spiral Tunnel de Sayerce in which trains make a turn to cross a height difference of almost 60 metres. Still an engineering feat.

Spanish pride

None other than Spanish King Alfons XIII and French president Gaston Doumergue opened the new Canfranc station on 18 July 1928. Those who arrived here (and still do) could not help but be impressed by the colossus, which even included a hotel, casino, hospital and strip club. The Spanish king wanted to show Europe what Spain was capable of as an industrial nation.

From that year, long-distance trains left Canfranc for Paris, Valencia, Madrid and Lisbon. Spanish steam trains from one end, electrically powered French trains from the other. Due to the difference in track widths (the international width of 1435 mm on the French side and the Iberian width of 1668 mm on the Spanish side), passengers going from Spain to France – and vice versa – had to change trains via the 25-metre-high station lobby. Here, French and Spanish customs were located as well as exchange offices and a kiosk.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t meant to last. During the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939), General Franco closed the crossing, fearing that Spanish resistance fighters would invade from France. The closure marked the end of grandeur for Canfranc and soon nature took over, and wildlife hopped over the tracks.

Bartering in WWII

This changed in World War II. German bombs destroyed the other train connections through the Basque Country and Catalonia. The only ‘usable’ route from France to Spain was now via Canfranc. It became the only place in Spain occupied by Nazis after the conquest of France. In 1942, the railway station was draped in swastika flags.

Hitler struck a deal with Franco: Germany needed Spanish tungsten ore for its war industry. In exchange, the Nazis traded spoils looted from occupied territories. Trains loaded with stolen gold, jewellery, furniture, watches and even dentures arrived at Canfranc station, where the cargo was exchanged for the valuable ore. Some historians claim this trade may have prolonged World War II by up to two years.

After the war, rumours persisted about trains carrying looted Nazi gold through Canfranc towards Spain and Portugal, but hard evidence remained elusive for decades. That changed in 2001, when French bus driver Jonathan Díaz discovered hundreds of abandoned documents in the station, meticulously detailing freight traffic between Franco’s Spain and Nazi Germany. The papers suggested that both Franco and Portugal’s dictator Salazar had collaborated more closely with the Nazi regime than previously assumed.

Yet the station’s history was far more complex than simple wartime trade. While gold and tungsten ore crossed the border in large quantities, Canfranc also became a place of escape and espionage. Wehrmacht documents and intelligence were smuggled through the station, while Jewish refugees and opponents of the Nazi regime used the route to flee across the Pyrenees to safety.

Schindler from Canfranc

Canfranc railway station became the centre of espionage and counterespionage, with French border guard Albert Le Lay at the centre of the web. He hosted the Nazis, serving them drinks and food, but meanwhile collaborating with the French resistance to sabotage the trains and get Jewish refugees and resistance fighters out of the country. As a spy, he provided information to the Allies for their invasion of Normandy.

To this day, Le Lay is honoured in Spain, as well as in Israel and the United States, as the ‘Schindler of Canfranc’ because he helped many people escape from the Nazis. European Jews, soldiers, pilots and spies used this ‘train to freedom’ between France and Spain, including famous artists Marc Chagall and Max Ernst and jazz legend Joséphine Baker. Le Lay himself was exposed by the Gestapo in 1943, but managed to get away in time. He fled to Africa via the southern Spanish port of Algeciras.

Ironically, when the collapse of the Third Reich was inevitable, hundreds of German soldiers also fled to Canfranc to escape the Allies. They chose the same route as jews and resistance fighters before them and came on foot from France through the railway tunnel.

End of an era

Train traffic between France and Spain via Canfranc continued until 1970. On 27 March that year, the brakes of a freigt train on the French side failed and the wagons fell into the Aspe river, along with a bridge. For the French, this was a welcome opportunity to shut down the loss-making line. The end of an international connection.

Since 2023, the old monumental station has been restored to its full glory. Besides 104 luxury rooms, the hotel Canfranc Estación also has three restaurants, a spa, a fitness studio and cocktail bar.

For years, residents of Canfranc have campaigned for the reopening of the rail link to France. Today, French railway authorities are actively studying the restoration of the missing 33-kilometre cross-border section between Bedous and Canfranc, with reopening plans currently targeting 2032. Until then, several daily buses connect Bedous with Canfranc, winding through the dramatic Vallée d’Aspe past abandoned tunnels, bridges and the remains of this once-legendary railway line.