Best home base for hiking Valais wine country

Short summary – read this first

A traveler is planning a 6-day trip from Geneva to Valais, focusing on day hikes in wine country and easy alpine hiking in Zermatt. They want to know the best towns to use as a home base and whether they need maps for the trails.

Key takeaways:
  • Consider staying in Sion or Sierre for easy access to both the wine region and Zermatt.
  • Purchase traditional hiking maps at local bookshops or find walking route maps at railway stations and photograph them for convenience.
  • Don't miss the 6km vineyard trail between Sierre and Salgesch, which includes a wine museum.
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InfoAI-generated summary
  • Riley
    Participant
    2 posts
    5 September 2022 at 20:40:02 #828269

    Traveling from Geneva to Valais. Would like to do day hikes in wine country as well as easy alpine hiking, possibly in Zermatt. What is the best town(s) to use as a home base? We will have 6 days to explore. Do we need maps for trails and if so where do we get them?

    Thx

  • User
    Inactive
    83503 posts
    Reply 1 of 2 • 5 September 2022 at 23:05:42 #946519

    For convenience of accessing both valley, hillside and mountains in the Valais region from one place well served by public transport, consider a larger town such as Sion or Sierre, or find a hotel at one of the villages with a railway station, anywhere on the main line railway between Martigny and Brig. From there you would be able to walk in the valley and take trains or buses to other places in the valley or higher up such as Zermatt.

    Traditional paper walking maps (Swiss national survey or Kummerley & Frey) can be purchased in book shops and newsagents in the local area.

    shop.swisstopo.admin.ch/en

    Online you can look at Schweiz Mobil: http://www.schweizmobil.ch/de/wanderland.html

    http://www.schweizer-wanderwege.ch/de/wandern/wanderland-schweiz

    Another way is to find the large poster wall map of walking routes that are placed near railway stations, then photograph it with your mobile phone or digital camera.

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    Anna
    Moderator
    7752 posts
    Reply 2 of 2 • 6 September 2022 at 8:26:58 #946520

    Hi Riley,

    Welcome to MySwissAlps.

    I agree with 1960man. Best to choose a base close to the railway stations. Sierre and Sion are two of the more established towns in the region, with good transport links, so would make a convenient base to explore the Valais’ wine region.

    There’s a 6km vineyard trail between Sierre and Salgesch, which also features a wine museum. Might be worth a visit. There is a Tourist Office in Sierre where you can get various local hiking maps and information.

    You can find various hiking options in Zermatt from the following link: http://www.myswissalps.com/zermatt/activities

    Regards,

    Anna

    regards,

    Anna

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