Traveling in Switzerland for 4 days by car

Hello, I am traveling in switzerland for 4 days and had a few questions about feasability and how to get to certain areas, rail passes etc...

I am renting a car so would like to avoid buying rail passes if needed

I will be flying in Zurich saturday 9/12 am - My first trip will be to the 5 lake hike to see wildsee and then staying in zurich that night

Sunday - I plan on going to Pilatus, Jungfrau and Nieseen - will I need a rail pass to get up all three of these mountains? If so does switzerland sell a day pass that will allow me to visit all three of these mountains?

Monday - I will be doing lac de moiry and staying at the bottom of zermatt

Tuesday - Arnesee lake and castles around there followed by geneva at night

Any help is appreciated

Hi mattowen0316,

Welcome and thanks for your first post! Without a rail pass the excursions you mentioned will be quite expensive. There's no one day pass. I would recommend a Swiss Half Fare Card. It provides a 50% discount on nearly all trips, which saves you around CHF 100 on the Jungfraujoch ride alone. Please see myswissalps.com/ swisshalffarecard for further details, and retailers.

By the way, visiting 3 mountains in 3 different areas in one day is too much. I would spread that across 2 or 2 days. Just the Jungfraujoch trip takes a day if you take your time, do the round trip and some sightseeing/hiking along the way. It can be done in half a day if you start very early and skip the sightseeing.

These pages might be helpful for you as well:

• myswissalps.com/car
• myswissalps.com/car/ carrental

Lac de Moiry is near Grimentz, at least 1.5 hours from Täsch near Zermatt.

Does this help you out?

Arno

Thank you so much - I believe we will spread the mountains out into two days per your suggestion

I was looking online and noticed the below prices do they seem correct

Pilatus - 74 roundtrip

Nieseen - 55 roundtrip

Jungfrau - 204 round trip

If i buy the half price swiss fare card I would be paying the 120 for the card then half off at each mountain is that correct?

Thank you

Hi mattow0316,

The prices seem fine to me. Indeed you'd pay only 50% of that with a Swiss Half Fare Card. You can buy the card for less than CHF 120 through www.raileurope-world.com/pass/swiss-half-fare-card, but delivery it takes up to 8 business days so that's a bit tricky in your case. You can also buy it through www.swissrailways.com/ en and print it at home. Don't wait too long as they need up to 3 business days to process and e-mail the card. Having it in hand save you time: no need to go to a rail station to buy one. You can show it to the ticket office of your first cable car and get the discount. Further purchase options are listed here.