[John2urbansy]

5 October 2018 at 4:03:08 #818598

To the MySwissAlps team and tourists

It was our first time to Switzerland. In planning for our itinerary to the aesthetic country for Sep this year, we found it not as easy as it was daunting given the many towns and distance from one destination to another. Unlike organising an itinerary say for Austria which is much simpler as we could easily locate a base at a certain city and then move out on day trips from there and return. However, as for Switzerland, its Alps, lakes and passes, it was mind boggling for us to determine where the best venue to use as a base, the distance from the main cities, transports (variety of transportation) and cost.

However, we must commend the MySwissAlps Team for their help in facilitating our trip. Who else would know better than these folks who knows their own country and the Alps like the back of their hand! We initially outlined Zurich as our base and then move out to places like Lucerne and Jungfraujoch which had we done so, it would not be as memorable a trip for us. Arno and Lucas from the MySwissAlps Team advised us against it as they felt Lucerne is “more interesting city” and advised us to either use Lucerne, Lauterbrunnen or Wengen as our base and travel from here to the mountains. At first, this appeared complicated and tedious as we fretted the idea of hauling our luggage around form train station to station in a foreign country. But we did change our itinerary and use Lucerne as our base instead. The results were wonderfully fulfilling for our journeys to/fro the lake town to the Alps, including Mt Pilatus and Lake Lucerne boat rides. We did finish off our trip in Switzerland in making Zurich as our last stop. Zurich was a modern organised city, no doubt, but not as vitally alive and beautiful as Lucerne. And, yes, per Lucas’s remarks, it was a ‘relatively painless’ train ride from Zurich to Salzburg.

MySwissAlps Team also advised us on using the Swiss Travel Pass and other types of Passes for which if you refer to the many questions posed by tourists in this Forum, you’ll find a lot of confusion regarding the use, or not, of the Pass. (Note: we admired the high degree of patience and grace by the MySwissAlps Team in repeating their answers to the many tourists asking the same questions again and again.) We did purchase the Swiss Travel Pass for a fixed consecutive 4-day period and it was very practical and cost-effective in the end given the many and varied types of transportation such as local, regional trains, bus, funicular, cogwheel, cable, gondola, boats! We thought that given the helpfulness of the MySwissAlps Team, the least we can do is to purchase the Swiss Travel Pass from one of their panel of card providers, in this case, Happy Rail. Although our purchase of the Pass was on the eve of our departure from our home country, the purchase was a cinch and breeze as the Happy Rail team was helpful and efficient.

So, thank you Lucas, Arno and the rest of the Team for making our trip a memorable and meaningful one. We’ll surely re-visit Switzerland again.

J.

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[Removed user]

6 October 2018 at 8:19:44 #897282

Hi John2urbansy and thanks for the trip report!

Did you find Switzerland trickier than Austria because there is just so much more to see and do here?
But I am glad to hear your trip went smoothly and we helped successfully plan your trip! 🙂