Jun 22, 2016 - 10:49 AM
Thank you Arno, Annika, Slowpoke and others who helped me plan our trip to Pontresina and Zermatt. We had visited the Bernese Oberland last year and wanted to see other parts of Switzerland this time. We spent 4 nights in Pontresina and 3 nights in Zermatt. We purchased the eight-day first class Swiss Travel Pass, which thanks to Arno's post about he special offer, we bought at a 30% discount. Even though the forecast showed it would rain every day, we had glorious weather every day except Thursday. It sprinkled a little on the other days, but most of the time, it was sunny with amazing views.
June 11
We landed in Zurich at 3 pm and decided to take the three-hour journey to Pontresina the same day because we didn't want to waste a day by staying overnight in Zurich and traveling the next day. We checked the train time table on MySwissAlps before hand and knew we had to change trains at Zurich HB, Chur, and Samedan. It was very convenient to know the platforms and the connecting times. Due to the efficiency and speed with which we went through immigration and got our luggage, we were able to get the train to Chur one hour earlier than we planned. I was worried about the two minutes of transfer time in Samedan with our luggage, but the experts had reassured me that the connecting train would be at the next platform. Even with luggage, we transferred without any problem.
June 12
We took the train to St. Moritz, walked around the lake, had lunch, bought chocolates from the Laderach store and visited the Segantini Museum. In the afternoon, we took the train to Morteratsch and walked to the glacier. This is an easy walk on a flat, wide path, but be prepared to walk six miles round trip. The sound of the mountain streams and the view of the glacier in the distance makes this hike quite riveting. It was a thrill to reach the tongue of the glacier but disconcerting to see how quickly the glacier was receding. It started raining on the way back, but we always had our light rain jackets with us, so it was not a problem.
Read part 2
