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So I’m going to be traveling to Switzerland with some friends, with my girlfriend meeting us along the way. How would you critique my travel plan?
Here is the itinerary:
- Day 1 – Geneva Airport – Lausanne (I arrive at 4pm to GVA, so I would like to keep this day short, but would be open to heading straight to Zermatt if the view would be scenic at this time)
- Day 2 – Lausanne – Zermatt (Plan to take an early scenic route if possible)
- Day 2 – Zermatt – Furi (Eat at Zum See)
- Day 2 – Furi – Zermatt (Head back to Zermatt, do the Mammot via ferrata)
- Day 3 – Zermatt – Lauterbrunnen (via Brig) (I was hoping to take a scenic train along this route. We are staying in Lauterbrunnen to explore the Bernese Oberland)
- Day 3 – Lauterbrunnen – Murren (return) (Head to Murren, do the Murren to Gimmelwald via ferrata)
- Day 3 – Gimmelwald – Schilthorn (return) (May drop this)
- Day 3 – Lauterbrunnen – Interlaken (return) (Head to town for dinner)
- Day 4 – Lauterbrunnen – Wengen (Train up to Wengen)
- Day 4 – Wengen – Grindelwald Grund (Cable Car to Grindelwald, eventually hike to Kleine Scheidegg)
- Day 4 – Kleine Scheidegg – Lauterbrunnen (Head back to Lauterbrunnen for the night)
- Day 5 – Lauterbrunne – Innertkirchen (My Great Grandmother lived here, so we are going to see the house and some relatives)
- Day 5 – Innertkirchen – Lucerne (explore Lucerne for the night)
- Day 6 – Lucerne – Mt Rigi Roundtrip (Hike Mt Rigi)
- Day 7 – Lucerne – Innsbruck (we leave Switzerland to make our way to Munich for Oktoberfest)
I’ve also attached the rail plan calculations, would these be accurate? I would prefer ticket-less traveling if possible, but with the mountain railways, I don’t believe this is possible
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Hello derlinger, and welcome to MySwissAlps!
It’s really nice that you get to visit the house of your family. Have you been to Switzerland before?
As for your plan:
- Day 1: Whether the trip to Zermatt is still worth it at 4 PM depends on when you travel. In December it won’t be as it gets dark around 5 PM.
- Day 2: You could travel via Montreux – Spiez (Golden Pass line) – local train via Kandersteg to Brig – then on to Zermatt. If you do, you can skip the local train on day 3 and take the fast one through the long tunnel.
- The rest of your plan look fine to me. The biggest risk is the weather as you only have limited time in each place.
Your calculations attachment contains a different itinerary than you’ve described. This might be a technical issue on our website (already scheduled to fix), I am not sure. Can you try to rename the file to “rail-pass-calculations-derlinger.xlsx”, for example, and attach it again?
Day 4 > It is not posible to travel from Wengen to Grindelwald grund by cable car in one time.
You must go in Wengen by cablecar to Mannlichen and with a other cable car from Mannlichen to Grindelwald Grund.
When you want to visit Grindelwald you must go by train from Grund to Grindelwald ( 5 minutes).
After visit Grindelwald you go by train to Kleine Scheidegg and to Wengen / Lauterbrunnen.
When you like to walk Mannlichen to KL. Scheidegg you can go by train to Grindelwald and back.
Greetings Brahms
Hi Arno,
Thanks for the reply. Day 1 would be Sunday, September 11, 2016 and Day 7 would be Saturday September 17, 2016.
I’ve found it hard to find restaurants that would be open on Sundays, so the current plan would be to try the Brasserie du Royal at the Royal Savoy in Lausanne, but am open for suggestions.
I’ve updated the attachment name so hopefully that helps. I’ve created a large set of iterations of the different options, which leads me to believe that a Swiss half-fare Card will be the cheapest route overall unless the ticket prices increase closer to the day of purchase. If that is the case it would be a Flexi-Combo (3 Days) as seen in Option F.
Hi Brahms,
Yes, sorry, we were thinking that it would take multiple cable cars, but I didn’t list them all out at they use the same network.
I had looked up the prices from this site to account for it:
http://www.maennlichen.ch/en/ grindelwaldmaennlichen -gondola-cableway.html
OK, On the site you can see:
Grindelwald-Grund–Männlichen
Männlichen–Wengen
Wengen–Lauterbrunnen (oder umgekehrt) Sfr. 57.80 or Sfr. 28.90 (discount)
Hi derlinger,
Thanks, that helped, I was able to open your calculations now. Note that Kleine Scheidegg to Lauterbrunnen is not 50% off with a Swiss Travel Pass. It’s hard to see, but if you zoom in on the map you’ll find that Kleine Scheidegg – Wengen is 25% off and Wengen – Lauterbrunnen is free. You’ll pay CHF 17.25, so that’s not very different from the amount you assumed.
Likewise, Gimmelwald – Schilthorn is not 50% off but free until Mürren, then 50% off from Mürren to Schilthorn.
Your option D is not correct: the Swiss Travel Pass Flex Combi needs to start and end with a free travel day, so you can’t start with discounted days. Please see myswissalps.com/ swisstravelpassflex/ howtouse.
After correcting the above you’ll probably end up with the Swiss Half Fare Card being the cheapest option, and the Swiss Travel Pass being second best. If the difference is only CHF 40 or so, like it is now, I would personally prefer the convenience of the Swiss Travel Pass: no tickets to buy apart from mountain transport, and extra trips and museums (e.g. in Lucerne) you may spontaneously add will be free.
Note that both the Swiss Travel Pass and Swiss Half Fare Card can be printed at home, which is recommend as you’ll be able to switch straight from the plane to the train, without queuing for a ticket office. It takes 1 to 3 business days to receive the e-mail with the pass. All options are here:
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