[Removed user]

17 May 2018 at 6:54:42 #816039

Hi! We are a family of 8, all adults and will be visiting Switzerland for the first time between June 6th to 14th after which we are heading to Paris for 3 days and the back to India.

We will be landing in Zurich by afternoon on the 6th and planning to depart on 14th morning to Paris . As i already understand, 7 days is not a lot of time to explore all the best places. To help plan my 8 night stay in Switzerland please suggest 3 or 4 core places to stay at to have the best overall experiences and so as to cover maximum day trips to the best places in the surrounding areas. Post my research I have zeroed in on 2 nights in Lucern, 2 or 3 nights in Interlaken, 2 nights in Zermatt and left with 1 or 2 nights for any other must-visit places that i have missed out or that you would suggest. Any other useful information or changes to my plan would be extremely helpful.

Thanks a ton!

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[Removed user]

17 May 2018 at 18:13:05 #885508

Hi Amit and welcome to MySwissAlps!

What are your core interests? You are going to see some great mountain landscapes on your current plan – do you want more of that? Or would you like something different like the french-speaking region around Montreux?

Are you looking for museum visits or lake cruises as an option? Zurich is good for the former and Lake Thun are nice options.

I’d skip Interlaken and stay in a smaller village nearby for 3 nights – Wengen and Grindelwald are popular choices.

[Removed user]

18 May 2018 at 0:48:08 #885509

>> 2 nights in Zermatt and left with 1 or 2 nights for any other must-visit places

Zermatt is at one end of the Glacier Express route. If you wanted to experience the Glacier Express (an 8-hour trip), you could spend one or two nights at the other end of it, i.e. St Moritz.

Reservations on the Glacier Express are compulsory, and cost CHF 33 per seat at this time of year. For a party of 8, there are insufficient seats left in 2nd class on any departures from Zermatt between 11-13 June 2018. However, there are currently enough 1st class seats available on the 9:52 departures on each of those days.

You can make reservations here:

shop.glacierexpress.ch /gex_en

Alpenrose

[Removed user]

18 May 2018 at 6:47:44 #885510

Hi Lucas, thank you for your reply.

We are looking to do more of great landscapes and scenery during this trip. Lake cruises also sound great. I am guessing we haven’t got a lot of time to visit maybe Montreux and Lugano for their French and Italian experiences which sound really interesting, so we are looking to do this during our next visit.

Any specific reason to skip staying at Interlaken? I had taken Interlaken into our choices as it seems to be very centrally located to some of the major attractions around there like Lake Brienze, Lauterbrunnen, Grindelwald, Thun and Wengen all of which we are planning to visit as day trips. Also Interlaken as we are looking to do the Golden Pass Line from Lucern and the Jungfraujoch Train. Please do let me know.

Is it possible to do a day trip from Interlaken to visit Zermatt and Matterhorn comfortably? If so, Please do suggest any other important attractions that we shouldn’t miss during our day trip to Zermatt and Matterhorn.

Thanks!

[Removed user]

18 May 2018 at 6:53:19 #885511

Hi! Thanks for your advice. Post more research we have decided to keep stays at St. Mortiz, Lugano, Bern, Lausanne and Zermatt as priority for our next trip sometime in the next two years. We want visit places around Interlaken and Lucern as thoroughly as possible during our trip now with a day trip to Zermatt down south being the only exception. We would also do the Glacier Express and Bernina Express on our next trip!

[Removed user]

18 May 2018 at 16:26:47 #885512

Hi Amit,

You are very right about Interlaken’s good location for rail connections in the region and beyond – I just prefer the more scenic towns nearby (Interlaken itself isn’t too pretty).

The towns I mentioned on my last post as well as Lauterbrunnen and Mürren aren’t too far away and you can still connect to the Golden Pass route easily enough (and you are closer to Jungfraujoch than Interlaken. But many people stay in Interlaken and enjoy it – just adding my 2 cents. 🙂

Check the Swiss railways timetable to plan out your trips and see what the travel times are like from various towns to Zermatt and others – see what works best for you.