WMart

Can anyone please have a suggestion for a zimmer or B&B (not large hotel in city) for 1 night for my wife, daughter and myself. We will be flying in from Australia end of Nov and picking up a hire car from near the airport. We don't mind if it is outside Zurich a little or near the airport.

jmw444

http://www.zum-goldenen-kopf.ch/

Hello. While waiting for other replies, you might like to take a look at this hotel in Bulach, which is about a 15 minute easy bus ride from the flughafen. The buses are easy to find, and Bulach has a lovely town center. I see that you plan to pick up a car. Bulach would be a very quiet drive through small villages.

The Zum Goldenen Kopf isn't a b&b, but a very pleasant hotel in an historic building. I stay with them the night before my departures every time I visit Switzerland.

J.

ira

Hi WM,

What's your budget?

WMart

Thanks for your replies. That is the sort of place we are looking for but preferably on the south side as we will probably be heading down to Grindelwald the following day. Is there a nice small town just south of Zurich with hotel??
Budget is around 100-120Euros per night for the 3 of us (including breakfast if possible)

Suelynne

Have you checked out
www.bnb.ch [Swiss B&B site]?
We've used it with great success.

Cicerone

South of Zurich, I would recommend the suburb of Thalwil, as there is an exit for this on the E-41 highway which you can connect to from the near the airport. This will be easy to find, even in the dark and on unfamiliar roads, as you can go highway the whole way. (It will be dark quite early in November.) By car from the airport, this is about 30 minutes. From the exit off the highway, follow signs for Thalwil Banhof, which will take you down the hill to the train station and the Hotel Sedartis. This is a modern hotel, but not large, and is quite nice. Rates vary quite a bit depending on weekday or weekend, so check the website; rates are of course quoted in CH for Switzerland, but converting to Euros they look to be about 150 Eur on weekdays and less on weekends (not sure if your quote was per person, per room ,etc). A suite may work well for your family. http://www.sedartis.ch/cmf/ If you don’t have breakfast included, there are several bakeries within walking distance, and a Starbucks as well.

Thalwil is a nice little village suburb on the lake, some good restaurants as well, including the hotel restaurant (not sure what time you arrive). In the morning, you can just go back up the hill to the highway and go on the Grindelwald, and you will have missed Zurich morning traffic (which is not bad except the ring roads around Zurich). (Personally IMO you will not want or need a car in this area, esp in November as the high passes will be closed, but perhaps you are going other places. If not, you might want to rethink the car. You will be paying for the car and esp for parking the car which you won’t be using a whole lot in the Grindelwald area.)

WMart

Thanks for your suggestions - we will look into the websites. We are travelling for 2 months around Switz, Austria, northern Italy and maybe Bavaria, hence the car. We like to stay in more authentic accom of each country but the first night we arrive we are not that fussy as long as it is close, clean and comfortable. When we come back to Zurich we will have time to stay in the B&B out a little way and then just drive to the airport - the one in Thalwil sounds good or the one in Bulach also sounds good.
What will the weather be like then?
Will we need snow chains to drive through the above countries? Where would we buy them? Any other suggestions you might have for us at that time of the year would be appreciated. Thanks

Cicerone

Generally, by end November in the Alp regions you should have some snow by then, perhaps not a lot down in places like Grindelwald itself but a good bit up in higher elevations. Temps should be around freezing in Grindelwald and below freezing further up. (Of course it could have been a very warm Fall, so you could have no snow, or you could have a ton if they get a cold Fall.). In Zurich and lower elevations like non-mountain areas of Bavaria, you will have cold temps but little or no snow. See weatherbase.com for temperature information. From mid-December through the rest of your trip you should, if lucky, have a good bit of snow even in low elevations in the mountain regions (but not city areas like Zurich, Milan, Lake Como, Florence, Munich, Vienna; although Salzburg does get a fair bit of snow. Rome and cities south of there virtually never get snow or even really cold temps, a brief cold snap perhaps, Rome gets snow a few times a decade.).

In my experience living in Switzerland you will NOT need snow chains in the winter on any roads. That is because all the really high passes are already closed (close in October and open in June). Any road which requires chains would say so (they generally <i>also</i> require 4-wheel drive so your car may not qualify on that score), and personally I would avoid them, as these are generally very high elevation roads that get little traffic and you would not need to use them to get from Point A to B; and as you aren’t familiar with them, I would not try to tackle them in snow-covered conditions (and I assume you are not used to driving on snow or ice). Major highways and even secondary roads are kept very clear in Switzerland, Germany and Austria (can’t really speak for Italy at that time, have not driven in the mountain regions in the winter months; major highways shold be fine, they are generally in lower elevations that get little snow in any event or are regularly cleared). Your rental car should have all-weather tires or even snow tires which are all you need. (Snow tires are not even needed really, although many Swiss still change over to snow tires every Fall, but good all-weather radials will do as good a job, and a <i>better</i> job on ice than snow tires, and you are more likely to find ice than snow on roads. If you want chains, I would definitely ask the car rental company about providing them, and check that your rental policy even allows you to drive on roads which require chains.)

Get a good road map, and look carefully at passes to see if the one you want to take is open. (For example, the Brunig Pass between Zurich and Grindelwald is open all year, this is not even above the tree line; but the Furka, Grimsel and Susten Passes in this area are all closed from October.) Also there are many car trains that you may find useful to save time and a good bit of driving. For example, to go from the Jungfrau to Zermatt in December you really need to take the car train tunnel, as otherwise driving at that time of year would require you to go far out of your way. The tunnel is called the L&ouml;tschberg, take a look at www.bls.ch/autoverlad. There is also one through the Furka Pass, see http://www.mgbahn.ch/travelinformati...port/furka.php. These car trains would be marked on a map. You pull onto a flatbed rail car and sit in the car as it goes through the tunnel, lots of fun actually. There is also a car train to go to St Mortiz, see http://www.rhb.ch/Vereina.83.0.html and http://www.rhb.ch/Albula.82.0.htmlmand one to go to Italy (although there is also just a regular highway tunnel too, but for the car train see http://mct.sbb.ch/mct/fr/reisemarkt/...autoverlad.htm. This tunnel is good if you want to go from say Zermatt (i.e. Brig) to Italy as it will save you time versus driving to the highway tunnel at Gotthard.) If you can, avoid car trains on Fridays as there can be lines with weekenders going for ski weekends.

Hopefully you will have parking at your hotels (not many offer this and it is not cheap, very few city hotels offer parking), or you might want to look into making parking reservations now for the public car parks, generally this would be most necessary over Christmas. To the best of my knowledge you can do this at Grindelwald, Saas Fee, Visp (for Zermatt) and most other places in Switzerland, not sure about other countries (I am fairly sure you could do it in Austria and Germany as they are as anal-retentive as the Swiss). If you have a chance to get a covered car park space, that is the way to go (i.e. Saas Fee, Lauterbrunnen), as trying to park in 3 feet of snow is not a lot of fun and trudging with suitcases over it not a lot of fun either. You will find car parks in ski resorts to be completely full over Christmas, and without a reservation you may be in for some trouble for parking. That is another reason to perhaps rethink the car and get a rail pass. Also, gas is about AUD2.30 a litre or so at this point.

WMart

Thank you Cicerone, you have been very helpful. We have travelled through these areas before but only in spring and summer so this is a new experience for us!! No we are not used to snow so we are a little nervous as to how we will go. Parking sounds interesting too - we are not used to having to pay for parking everywhere except right in the city centres. But we are looking forward to the experiences.
Anything else that you think might be of help, we would appreciate it.
We are hoping to spend Xmas week in Salzburg where our daughter &amp; son-in-law from UK will fly across to meet up with us. Do you know of any B&amp;B's there? Thanks for your advice.

ira

HI WM,

In Salzburg, I can very highly recommend
www.ammoos.at/main.php?language=en&amp;m=home

The Strassers are very good hosts. The food is good. The rooms are comfortable.

They are at the edge of town, 2-min walk from the bus stop. 12 min to downtown. Free parking.

Get the Salzburg card.
www2.salzburg.info/sehenswertes_281.htm

Enjoy your visit.

jmw444

Hello again, south of the flughafen and west of Zurich is the little town of Dielsdorf (with its charming neighbor Regensberg). I almost selected the Lowen there when I was looking for my night-before accommodations.

http://www.loewen-dielsdorf.ch/

J.

jmw444

oops, charming neighbor Regensdorf.

Cicerone

I don’t know of B&amp;Bs in Salzburg, but generally find Karen Brown’s book and website to be helpful when looking for smaller inns in Europe, so I would suggest you try that, and the other websites below:

karenbrown.com
frommers.com
tripadivsor.com (this has ratings by people who have stayed and is very useful)
relaischateaux.com
romantikhotels.ch
www.swisshotels.ch
alpineclassics.ch

The last two are for Swiss hotels, but you may find links to Salzburg and other hotels. Also you might post a new question here for reccos. I would also suggest you start booking for Christmas week immediately, as you may have trouble in Salzburg at Christmas, I think you will find it quite popular. You may even find a minimum number of required nights (I may be wrong, but am extrapolating from resorts which do generally require this, but check now). The first week in January will probably be pretty popular also in the resort areas so you may want to book something there also if you want to be in the mountains. Other than that, you can be more relaxed about bookings, although in some places, like Como, you may find more closed hotels than open ones, so again start looking at guidebooks now so you have some back-ups in case you get there and find your first choices are closed.

As I don’t now your exact itinerary, some suggestions would be:

I would avoid Venice in November, it is prone to rains and flooding, go later in your trip, but also watch Carnivale, when rooms can be hard to get and expensive (in 2009 this starts around February 13 and runs for about 10 days), unless you want to be there for that.

I would go to Vienna <i>before</i> Christmas as IMO they have the best Christmas markets. I would also go to Germany before Christmas for their Christmas markets as well. These generally start in mid-November, so you have a good bit of time to see several. You can then go on the Salzburg very easily from either Germany or Vienna.

I would do the lowlands and Christmas markets in November and December (when mountain areas may still be transitioning to winter, many hotels do not re-open for the winter season until mid-December) and save the mountains for after Christmas when they will be in snow and at their most beautiful (I happen to think the Swiss Alps are more beautiful in winter than at any other time of year.) You could do a circuit of the north from eastern France, to Germany to Austria and then after Christmas in Austria (including St Anton if you like skiing), go either to Italy or back to Switzerland and then Italy.

While it may not be on your itin (and perhaps you have been there before), the Strasbourg and Colmar area of France, which is just over an hour east and north of Zurich by car, have very good Christmas markets as well, and Colmar is an extremely charming village. (Good antiquing as well.) You may even want to go there first, as you could drive there from the airport fairly easily, and there is a lovely inn, the Hotel les tetes (http://www.la-maison-des-tetes.com/home_us.html) that is in your budget. Might be a nice start for the trip. This whole area is very beautiful rolling countryside.

The World Cup for men’s downhill skiing is in Wengen (i.e. Grindelwald and the Jungfrau valley) in January and this is a hoot to attend and if you have any interest, and can work your itin around this I would try. Besides the skiing, there are Swiss bands, foods, and just a great party atmosphere, and the weather generally cooperates (at least in the years I went) by being sunny. For 2009 it will be the weekend of January 16-18, see http://www.wengen.com/evelhr.html and http://www.fis-ski.com/uk/discipline...scalendar.html. Make a hotel booking now if you want to stay for the weekend, you can also drive/train in for the day (although it is a long day done that way, but I have even done it as a day trip from Zurich). There may be other similar events in Austria or Italy during your visit, see the website above.

I really would not worry about the snow, the reason that the parking lots have snow is because the Swiss and Austrians, at least in my experience, choose not to plow their parking lots in mountain areas. (Germans tend to be the same from my limited experience driving in mountains there.) They plow their roads scrupulously, or close secondary roads and passes. But the parking lots can be interesting, which is why if you can get into a covered one, you are better off.

I agree that Regens<i>berg</i> is extremely charming (it is the berg at the top of the hill that is charming, not the dorf which is at the bottom of the hill where the train station is, and Dielsdorf is not so charming either), but would actually save it for the return trip, as it is about 10 minutes from the airport and is also on the “wrong” side of Zurich for avoiding morning traffic if you do intend to go on to Grindelwald the next day. If you intend to go to Colmar or Germany, then Dielsdorf or Regensberg is fine, but really it is so close to the airport (you can see the planes landing and taking off) that IMO it is better suited for an overnight before your flight out. You won’t save any appreciable drive time getting “away” form the airport by staying there. There is also a very charming B&amp;B <i>in</i> Regensberg, the Rote Rose (http://www.rote-rose.com)

WMart

Thanks again - your help and suggestions have been very much appreciated. Could you please tell us more about what Xmas markets are? We have noticed that they seem very popular but have no idea what it means.

Cicerone

Oh, these are wonderful crafts markets selling toys (esp wooden toys), candles, decorative housewares, Christmas tree ornaments, cr&egrave;che figurines and other Christmas gifts, mostly all hand made, as well as Christmas foods. In German, they are called “Christkindlmarkt”. In most places, they are set up in stalls outdoors in public squares, or large indoor venues and have a very festive atmosphere (mulled wine, called “gl&uuml;hwein” is a great thing to beat the cold). Many places have choirs and bands as well with Christmas music either in the market or in local churches. They run from mid-November until about December 23/24, and go daily (in a few places not Sunday) into to the early evening each day. In the evening, when the streets are lit with decorations and the snow is falling on the cobblestones and you are walking around with a cup of hot wine listening to a choir, it is just really beautiful. Zurich, sadly, does not really have a good Christmas market (although the main street, the Bahnhofstrasse puts on a good light show and there are usually choirs on certain days), but at least it gave me an excuse to try others. Vienna’s is especially large and very good. Many German towns have good ones too, I think most every town has one; Cologne’s is very large and nice, but I think you could find a good one in almost any German town or village, esp along the romantic road. In the German part of France, like Strasbourg or Colmar, which I mentioned above, you can find them as well. Konstanz, on the German side of Lake Konstanz between Germany and Switzerland, has a nice one as well.

Some people plan entire trips to Europe around going to these markets, run a search here and you should find more information.

The Italians do not have these markets on the same scale (although they certainly have a build up to Christmas), which is why I recommended going to Germany and Austria before Christmas to see the really big ones and perhaps doing Italy after Christmas.

capekidnappers

Looks like an old thread - but we recently stayed in Hotel St Josef in Zurich - another Fodorite's recommendation thank you.

10 - 15 minute's walk or 5 minute taxi from Zurich central train station, which was an easy train ride (20 - 30 minute's?)from Zurich Airport.

We arrived around 8pm from New Zealand via Singapore, and left the following morning for Grindelwald. Just walked back to the train station, got a Swiss Flexi Rail Pass from the helpful girl at the Visitor Information Centre at the train station, then caught the train to Grindelwald and by lunch time were sitting outside a Grindelwald cafe beneath the Eiger.

The St Josef was clean, comfortable, well equipped and breakfast probably the best in three week's stay in Switzerland. Rate was CHF 145 double, with shared bathroom and shower on the floor - 2 bathrooms and only three guest rooms on each floor. www.st-josef.ch