Baron_von_Prat

We took the train from Wengen to Schynige Platte this past August. With the HFC (half-fare card), the price round-trip was 80 Swiss Francs per person.

DO NOT--I repeat--DO NOT MISS Schynige Platte.

We also took the train from Wengen down to Lauterbrunnen, then the cable car up to Gralschep (sp?), then the train to Murren. We walked through Murren, stopped at Coop for some snacks, then headed up to the Schilthorn.

Be very careful up at the Schilthorn. Keith and I both suffered terrible altitude sickness. We tried to calm ourselves down by having a coffee in the revolving restaurant, but that only made us more dizzy. Positively DREADFUL, sweetie darling.

We met a very nice family from Holland who where also sick and had headaches. We all went back down in the cablecar together. We encounter an English lady who said she couldn't wait to get to the karzi so she could vomit.

If you are prone to getting dizzy or have bad sinuses, I wouldn't advise a trip the Schilthorn.

We LOVED LOVED LOVED the hike from Mannlichen to Kleine Scheidegg. It was so much fun seeing the cows and goats. One of the goats tried to eat my 18K gold ring from ilias lalaounis. Thankfully, I pulled away my hand in time or believe me, that goat would have been made into lamb chops!

We did NOT like Interlaken. There were too many tourists and too many cheap tacky shops selling no-name sunglasses that would certainly NOT be at home on Madison Ave in the 70's. DREADFUL.

We stayed at the Baur au Lac Hotel in Zurich. Keith accidently dropped a potted orchid into the bathtub and I spilled a bottle of red wine all over the carpet.

I think the staff was happy to see the two alcoholics leave before the had to redecorate our room.

If you ever want to see the SNOOTIEST people in all of Switerzland, have a cocktail in the Terrasse Restaurant of the Baur au Lac Hotel. We saw women who made Zza Zza Gabor look like a wallflower.

We even saw a man come to dinner wearing Burberry pj's with a dinner jacket over them.

"Tres, tres guache, Francine. Heinz we should have gone straight to Peck/Peck." (John Waters reference, sweetie darling.)

We also stayed at the Montana in Luzern and LOVED it. It is high on a hill overlooking the lake. Very beautiful and an amazing breakfast buffet.

I also want to plug the Hotel Schonegg in Wengen. THE FOOD WAS AMAZING!!!!!

I give it Thin's Stamp of Approval.

Take care, sweetie darling,
The Baron von Prat

PalenQ

Schynige Platte - the train up here from Wilderswil, on the edge of Interlaken is one of the few in Switzerland not 10% covered by a Swiss Pass, but only 50% off - I guess because it does not link two cities or villages - but a mountain top - if you love Teddy Bears Schynige Platte is the place - and for Alpine flowers in its famous Alpine garden - and sweet hikes, including back down to the Interlaken area or towards Grindelwald.

Schynige Platte with Alpine Garden and "Teddyland" (1967 m/6454 ft). ... Test Centre and, especially for our little ones, a large Teddy Bear exhibition. ...
http://www.magicswitzerland.com/acti...interlaken.htm

PalenQ

OP's question regarding Eurailpasses and Jungfrau Region trains - the pass gives a 25% discount only on these trains - Interlaken-Grindelwald-Kleine Scheidegg - Jungfraujoch and Interlaken-Lauterbrunnen-Murren and also Lauterbrunnen-Wengen-Jungfraujoch. But nothing on anything else like Murren to Schilthorn or any gondolas except the Lauterbrunnen-Grutschalp one that takes you to Murren (train Grutschalp to Murren included in 25% off. Again a discount does not entail the use of a day on a flexipass.

OP could consider thus buying a Eurailpass Select Flexipass valid in France, Switzerland and Italy and use it to get discounts above Interlaken and to cover all other trains on their itinerary.

PalenQ

I understand that once you leave Interlaken and head up into the bernese oberland area that there are extra fees you must pay if you only have a eurorail pass. Where can I find what these extra fees are?>

To clarify perhaps - there are no extra fees beyond Interlaken - you just get a 25% discount off the cost of a regular ticket when you show you hve a Eurailpass valid in Switzerland. And Eurails pass also 100% on boats on Lake Thun and Lake Brienz, the two lakes that bookend Inter-Laken - between the lakes.

kybourbon

Rick Steves has a list of rail pass supplement costs. Not sure if it includes the Swiss ones you are asking about. Note the prices are for getting the reservations in Europe. It will be more to purchase from RailEurope in advance.

http://www.ricksteves.com/rail/pdfs/reservations.pdf

PalenQ

Ricksteves I think is just copying the list of supplements that appears on the Eurail Map of Europe that comes with the pass - prices in euros for any mandated extra cost. and indeed it is often much more expensive to reserve thru RailEurope, Italy being the one exception that I know of where last year at least it was cheaper to book ES trains thru RE than in Italy (assuming several seats total were being booked to defray the $18 or so one-time per order booking fee. But some like in France are $12-23 vs 3 euros or $5.

Wekiva

PQ....I talked to Byron yesterday and will most likely get our passes through him. It's very nice to speak to someone who knows passes forward and backward and is willing to spend time talking about it.

He thinks my best bet is to get a 3 country pass and NOT get the swiss pass. This weekend I'm going to try and compare the costs again and will buy next week.

Thanks again for your help (and others as well).

PalenQ

wekiva - thanks for the thanks! The 3-country pass would cover all travel up to Interlaken and then give 25% off many trains up from there into the hills - and again with a flexipass if it is a discount you do not use one of your unlimited travel days - those need only be used when things are 100% covered - like the boats on the lakes and with a first-class pass you can then ride on the IME much more nice upper deck, which requires a first class pass.

enzian

A couple of important points if you are interested in saving money.

A 3-country pass is only available in 1st Class, and you won't be using First Class on the Swiss trains and lifts in the Lauterbrunnen area. So you are paying extra for something you don't need.

A 3-country pass just doesn't work as well in Switzerland as a Swiss Pa;ss. For example, you are spending your time in the Lauterbrunnen area, and riding lifts and trains where a 3-country pass will give you only a 25% discount off the full fare. A Swiss Pass, for example a 4-day pass, would fully cover much of this (up to Mürren for example), and the rest would be 50% (I see you are not going up the Jungfrau, which is only 25% even with a Swiss Pass).

Finally, you can get advance-purchase discount tickets from Paris to Basel and from Zurich to Milan on the Swiss rail site, www.rail.ch. Paris to Basel for 27 CHF and Zurich to Milan for 30 CHF, both in second class which is fine. The price includes reserved seats. We did this for our trip last summer and saved 496 CHF for the 4 of us. ging to Milan (on your way to Venice) via Zurich instead of Brig will take a wee bit longer, but is well worth the significant saving. Plus, it is a more scenic trip. (You would actually board the train at Arth=Goldau, a short hop from Luzern, instead of going into Zurich itself).

So if we were doing this trip, we'd get a 4-day Swiss pass in 2d class (total; $436 including free Family Cards), buy the advance fare discount tickets mentioned above, and buy point-to-point tickets in Italy, where train travel is relatively inexpensive. We had no trouble getting our 4 seats on the Italian ES and IS trains buying just one day in advance.

PalenQ

A 3-country pass is only available in 1st Class, and you won't be using First Class on the Swiss trains and lifts in the Lauterbrunnen area>

Well yes you will presumably use and benefit by first class getting to Lauterbrunnen from Paris and even the train to Lauterbrunnen from Interlaken has first class. But the lift and train to Murren is indeed one class but it is a very minor part of your overall trains. This is not to say that enzian does not make some valid points if you can indeed score the 27 and 30 euros tickets he/she talks about.

PalenQ

inally, you can get advance-purchase discount tickets from Paris to Basel and from Zurich to Milan on the Swiss rail site, www.rail.ch. Paris to Basel for 27 CHF and Zurich to Milan for 30 CHF, both in second class which is fine. The price includes reserved seats. We did this for our trip last summer and saved 496 CHF for the 4 of us.>

check this out to see if this is a regular offer or, as is my understanding, a periodic offering that you have to constantly monitor to get and is not nearly always available. Perhaps Enzian can correct me if what I think is not so and these fares are always offered. This has not been my experience.

enzian

enzian is a "she"---the Enzian is a beautiful little deep blue Swiss alpine flower.

I've seen those discount Paris/Basel and Zürich/Milan fares on the SBB website every time I've looked it over the past 9 months, ever since I first heard about them. If you input a route that would benefit from on or the other, the flag will show up, and if you go to "buy" the fare will appear if still available. Whether you can get it for a particular route depends on when you book; availablity is limited and the low-cost fares do sell out. However, I had no trouble getting it for the date and time we wanted, by booking 60 days in advance.

My point about getting little benefit from First Class with the 3-country pass in Switzerland was really related more to the limited benefit overall of the 3-country pass in the Berner Oberland. Once they leave Interlaken, going to Lauterbrunnen and beyond, they will still have to go to the ticket windown and purchase tickets, paying 75% of the fare even tho' they have a pass. Since most of the travel that Wekiva lists---up to Mürren and the Schilthorn, over to Wengen, up to Schynige Platte, etc.---is all beyond Interlaken, the 3-country pass will only cover 25% of this.

Also, with the 3-country pass, won't they also have to buy them for the kids?

There's no free Family Card like there is with the Swiss Pass. So that's another $300 + dollars per child for those passes. And the Youth passes are in second class, so assuming the parents want to ride with the children, they will either have to sit in 2d class with their 1st class passes, or pay a supplement (the fare difference between 1st and 2d class) to have the kids sit in 1st class. And all of them will have to pay seat reservation fees for the train from Paris into Switzerland, as well as the IC train from Spiez to Milan, and ES train from Milan to Venice. Those seat reservations fees are included in the dicount tickets I suggested above.

PalenQ

Just a note about the Eurail Select Pass - if you do end up buying one there is a special for buying before Mar 31, 2011 - if you buy a 6- 8- or 10-day pass by then you get an extra day free - and you have six months to validate the pass and then use it for its 2-month validity period after that - so if you do do the Select Pass buying it before the end of March can make it a better deal.

enzian

I just hope they read through this before they buy those four 3-country passes that Brian suggested.

Even if they just get the minimum number of days (5), they'll pay $1472 for the passes, and still will have to add on the cost of seat reservations from Paris to Basel, and Spiez to Milan to Venice, and Venice to Rome, as well as 75% to 100% of the cost of all their travel in Switzerland above Interlaken (assuming the 3-country pass gives a 25% discount on "non-covered" days---I don't know that it does).

With all the add-ons it must come to $1800 or more. But they will travel first class, FWIW.

My suggestion is the 2d class Swiss Pass for $436 total; add on the discount fares for the two legs in and out of Switzerland (and call it 70 CHF, not 27, for Paris to Basel as that is all that seems to show up); plus a First-Class fare from Milan to Venice on the Frecciarossa, and it is still under $1000. If they want to travel First Class on the paris to Basel run and Arth-Goldau to Milan, the discount fares are available in First Class as well, but that will kick it a bit over $1000 total.

Wekiva

Enzian...I am reading indeed!

I spent several days comparing the prices and have moved back to the 2 country pass and the swiss pass. We've fine tuned our itinerary a bit more and found that we will be taking the Thun boat tour which was a great benefit of the swiss pass. By the time I was done adding up all the things we'd be doing around Murren the costs were about the same (3 country pass vs 2 country and swiss) and that was before I added in the boat tour and any other museums we hope to do (I've started another post about what is available to do in Lauterbrunnen valley with Swiss Pass).

I know there are ways to save money over what I am doing (including your individual ticket purchase from rail.ch) but I'm just at the end of my rope for train stuff. I really enjoy the planning process but all of the pass options were taking up too much time to truly figure out. As much as this trip is costing if I end up spending a bit more on the passes by keeping it simple...then so be it. We are going to go first class (except for the eurostar) and will be making reservations for most of the long legs since we've got a group of 8 (w/ 4 kids) and don't want to worry trying to get everyone seated together.

I really do appreciate the advice from you all. Our next trip will be sans kids and I'll be ready to try some of these great cost saving ideas.

PalenQ

Yup a party of 8 makes it all the more difficult - esp for the person who is the planner and thus subject to make sure it all goes smooth. I do not envy that and I do agree with making advance seat reservations so you get a block of seats - and for such a group I would encourage first class on the international segments as you have decided. In fact I always advocate first class for the one-time tourist - many Fodorites say there is no difference between classes but in my four decades of incessant riding of European trains I adamantly claim that there is a big difference and this is why many Europeans pay more to ride in first class - even in Switzerland on Inter-city trains.

I agree with Enzian about the efficacy of a Swiss Pass and this was my original take.

Wekiva

PalenQ
As my train travel planning draws to a close I once again thank you for your help.

Now that airline tickets, hotel/apartment reservations and train passes are decided I can relax and finalize our day to day things to see in each city. That will be much easier.

PalenQ

Wekiva - thanks for the thanks - and about when to buy a Swiss Pass - one reason to wait is that the past few years in the specials have popped up on Swiss Passes - unannounced but often giving an extra day on many types of passes or like in 2010 free trips to mountain tops that were normally 50% off. so there is no reason to buy any Swiss Pass IMO until a comfortable time before your trip to get the pass (if buying here and like said prices fluctuate so check prices both in $s (Can and US) and Swiss francs.

and yes to make decisions is nice and thanks also to folks like enzian and swandav - two of Fodor's most helpful Swiss travel experts and others like Baron - Fodor's is IMO often invaluable to helping folks find the best possible ticket to ride, so to speak!

Alice9

ttt

kwren

Wow - like Wekiva, I have a lot of decisions to make about our passes for the end of June. I'm going to start digesting the above and then will be back. I've also used Byron in the past so will be calling him as well!

Should I add onto this thread or would it be better to start a new one? I never know which way to go on that.
Thanks!