Swiss Pass or Europass Bernina Express

A Group of six of us will be in Europe in late August to early September and are interested either a swiss or europass for train travel for 6 Adults.Or would it be better to buy single tickets. Train travel will be:

1. Zurich to Interlaken 29/08//2016
2. Interlaken to various locations 30/09,31/09
3. Interlaken to Geneva 1/09/2016
4. Venice to Chur via the Bernina Express 28/09/2016
5. Chur to Zurich Airport 29/09/2016

Thanks for posting Goz!

You do need a rail pass. Assuming the "various locations" also includes cable cars and mountain trains, regular tickets are way to expensive.

I'm not sure if I understand your entire itinerary. Are you staying for a month in total, and indeed most of the time in Italy?

My recommendation would be to consider these passes/tickets:

• myswissalps.com/ swisstravelpass
• myswissalps.com/ swisshalffarecard
• myswissalps.com/ eurailselectpass (2-country Switzerland/Italy pass)
• myswissalps.com/ traintickets/italy

The links provide all the details, and this page helps you choose. Feel free to ask if you have more questions after looking into that. One more note: take a good look at the "Where it's valid" sections of the pages. Eurail passes provide less in Switzerland than the other passes. Tickets in Italy are not as expensive as in Switzerland, so depending on your plans you may not need a pass there.

Thanks for the reply

As stated we will be in switzerland:

• Zurich to Interlaken 29/08/2016
• Interlaken to various locations 30/09,31/09
• Interlaken to Geneva 1/09/2016
• Venice to Chur via the Bernina Express 28/09/2016
• Chur to Zurich Airport 29/09/2016

from the 4th to the 28th sept we will be on a cruise . So my question is will we be able to get a pass for the dates we are in Switzerland

Hi Goz,

I really want to help but you repeated your travel plan, and I still don't understand it. It starts with a date in late August, then late September, then September 1. It's not clear to me. Apart from the passes I listed before, you may want to take a look at the Swiss Travel Pass Flex, which is valid for up to one month. If your travel dates are correct, that pass covers all dates apart from one day, as your plan seems to cover a month + 1 day 929/8 to 29/9).

Hi Goz -

I agree with Arno. I can't understand the itinerary you propose.

Where will you be between August 29 and September 1? How about September 2 and 3?

Why will you go to Zürich airport on September 29, in order to transfer to Interlaken on September 30?

Slowpoke

Hi Goz, I looked over your dates is this your itinerary ? I think you had September when it should be August and the 2-3 of September was not included.

• 29 August 2016 Zurich to Interlaken
• 29/08/2016 30 31 August 2016 Interlaken to various locations
• 30/09,31/09 I think you mean August
• 1 September, 2016 Interlaken to Geneva
• 1/09/2016 2-3 September ?? Missing 4-28 September 2016
• Cruise out of the country 28 September 2016 Venice to Chur via the Bernina Express 28/09/2016
• 29 September 2016 Chur to Zurich Airport 29/09/2016

Hi WSBeVier-

Welcome to the Forum -

Thanks for jumping in.

Unfortunately, your formatting does not make it easy to understand your response.

If you compose off line, and paste into the forum, the usual result is a disaster.

The forum software is not capable of clearly importing document files. Hardly easy on the users.

Still, we work with what have.

Could you rework your response in some way to make it clearer?

Thanks,

Slowpoke

Hi I hope This helps

we arrive in Zurich 28th Aug then travel to Interlaken 29 th Aug

we want to stay in Interlaken for three days do day trips from there

From Interlaken on the 1st Sep travel to Geneva to pick up a flight to Barcelona

stay in Barcelona from the 1st to 4th to board a 24night Mediterranean cruise

The cruise ends in Venice on the 28th Sep from there we would like to make our way to Chur Switzerland via the Bennina Express from Posibbly Milan Italy open to ideas

Then from Chur return to Zurich to catch flight to Sydney

Hi Slowpoke and welcome WSBeVier!

Here's bit of background info on copying and pasting text: in general it's kind of risky to copy text from any website to any other website or program, or from any program (Word, Excel) to any website. The result is often incomplete or formatted incorrectly. This forum has that issue too. We're aware of it, made some improvements over the years, and it's still on our to do list for further improvement. It will never be perfect though. The basic software needs to improve, but that's out of our hands. It's good to know that:

• if you copy and paste text from anywhere, assume that it will be formatted to plain text, so line breaks, font types, etc. are lost. You can reformat your message though.
• even after submitting a post, one can edit it (to add blank lines, bullet points). The only exception are first time users like WSBeVier as they first need to pass a spam check and can't edit or post until that's completed. In this case I edited the post for better readability.

Indeed we need to work with what we have. I hope this helps!

Hi Goz,

The Swiss Travel Pass Flex and Swiss Half Fare Card are valid for one month. So from August 29 to September 28 in your case. For September 29, you would buy a regular ticket. Please see the links for details. The timetable helps you find the trains. If you need accommodation suggestions, you can post specific requirements here.

G'Day Goz-

Thanks for the clarification. It helps a lot.

Arno has answered your questions about passes.

I thought to add a brief comment about the trains.

The time table that Arno linked you to can be very helpful, and the SBB (Swiss Rail) website has a tremendous amount of information available on most all aspects of rail travel, buried down in multilayer menus. ;-(

www.myswissalps.com/ti metable

That links you directly to the timetable.

This is for the whole SBB site:

www.sbb.ch/en/home.htm l

The trip - Zürich Airport to Interlaken Ost (IO) and thence afterwards to Geneva:

There is very very frequent service from the airport to downtown Zürich, so that your stopover can be at an airport hotel or in downtown Zürich. Some trains from the airport to Interlaken route directly to Bern and then to Interlaken. Most, however, route through Zürich main station and can involve a change of trains there. Zürich to Interlaken Ost is just under 2 hours.

A scenic and slower route to Interlaken is to travel via Luzern, then take the Luzern to interlaken 'Express" which travels over the Brunig Pass, and is part of the "Golden Pass" route. 2 hrs 51 minutes.

www.myswissalps.com/go ldenpass

I don't know how much time you have or would like to take. Either Bern or Luzern is a possible stop for a few hours. Both are nice, but Luzern is more scenic right off the train. Let us know if you want to stop. There is a place for lunch in Luzern that I like a lot, along the river in the old town. Bern has one near the Nydegg bridge over the Aare.

www.myswissalps.com/be rn

www.myswissalps.com/lu cerne

When using the timetable, the default routing provided is the fastest route.

Alternatives can be forced by using the "connections" or "via" option, and inserting a midpoint, such as Luzern on the route to Interlaken from Zürich.

If you work with a map, that helps visualize these alternatives. This one is especially helpful for Switzerland:

map.search.ch/

Use of the menus and zoom on that map gives station icons, and gives a short timetable of transport from to or from that station.

You probably already know what you want to do whilst staying in Interlaken, but this may be helpful:

www.myswissalps.com/be rneseoberland

and, specifically,

www.myswissalps.com/ju ngfrauregion

Interlaken to Geneva:

The fast route goes through Bern. 2 hours 48 minutes every hour on the hour. At each hour at xx29, a slightly slower route involves an additional change at Spiez.

The slower route follows the Golden Pass routing, going via Zweisimmen ( and, with that choice made) through Montreux. The section from Zweisimmen to Montreux is particularly attractive on the descent from Montbovon to Montreux.

4 hours 20 to 4 hrs 50 minutes. More changes of train.

Many of the trains after Zweisimmen have panoramic window cars to Montreux.

Sounds like you have created a very nice itinerary. Switzerland gives you some options to refine it, if you wish.

Quite a variety. Enjoy it!

Slowpoke