Base hotel in Switzerland
 

I will be visiting Switzerland for one week in May with my wife and 4 year old. We are looking to have a home base hotel for plenty of day trips in Switzerland. Please give me suggestions with hotel information. We will be in Munich the previous week.

Thanks!

Although I usually steer people toward staying longer in one place, if I were you I actually might consider breaking the week into two parts in this case.

The best base in my opinion would be somewhere in the Berner Oberwald -- between Luzerne (or possibly there itself since there are so many train and boat connections) and one of the mountain towns like Grindelwald. Spending the full week in one of the mountain towns (which would be my first choice) means there is a lot of duplicate travel if you are trying to venture to other parts of Switzerland a lot.
For variety, you could spend a few days in Montreux. From there you could do the chocolate train to Gruyeres, see sites on the lake, and even head off to Zermatt and the Matterhorn for the day. But I think your full week in Montreux would be missing much of the "better" Switzerland.
With the 4 year old, what is your goal? Hiking may be out. Do you picture visiting towns and cities, riding boats and seeing scenery, riding cable cars to tops of mountains? Do you picture a more relaxing a more active week?

Thanks for the tips. We plan on combining some small towns with the mountain cable cars. Since we have a 4 year old, hiking is out of the question. We will have access to a car for access to anywhere. We want avoid the large cities and my son is very curious about Matterhorn. We will be returning back to Munich to go back home.

Lucerne would be a good base for at least part of the time. There is a great transportation museum there. Nearby, Mt. Pilatus is a good excursion and also has an alpine slide, that I imagine a young child could ride on with an adult. Also, the boat ride on the lake is absolutely phenomenal, and a four year old should enjoy that, too. Then, take the train down to Zermatt for a few days, and you've seen two beautiful areas of Switzerland.

We spent 3 days in Lauterbrunnen in the Bernese Oberland this past May at the Hotel Oberland. We visited the Schilthorn via cable car from Stechelberg (a short drive or bus ride from Lauterbrunnen), then we took a drive around Lake Thun with stops in Spiez (has a lovely little marina with children's playground, a garden and lots of ducks and swans to feed) and Thun (a great lake promenade with cafes, another children's playground, ducks, swans, etc.) One thing we didn't do that might be of interest to a 4 yr old is Trummelbach falls, it's a huge waterfall inside a mountain. Another interesting but expensive trip that we have done on other occasions is to Jungfraujoch with it's ice cave and cogwheel train up the mountain.

There are also good train connections from Lauterbrunnen via Interlaken to many other cities in the surrounding area.

For what you describe I would definitly pick Interlaken. Yes, it's touristy (that's what most people give as the reason they don't like it) - there are lots of large hotels and restaurants and touristy shops. But you can't beat it for location. Easy day trip into the mountains for scenery, easy access to the lakes. We did day trips (2) into the mountains, spent one day on the lake (took a train to Thun, you could drive through) and took the boat back, and did another day trip to Bern.

I recommend Hotel Lotschberg (www.lotschberg.ch/) which is on a quiet side street and it did have parking. Also only a five minute walk to the train station if you want to take the train (which in some cases will be easier than driving I think). We stayed in Suzie's B&B which is the building right next door to the hotel itself, and we stayed in an apartment, really only a large room with kitchenette and bathroom, but that might be good for a family with a four year old.

I would agree that in that part of the the BO if you want the most convenient rail connections you should pick Interlaken since you almost inevitably have to travel through it to get anywhere else by rail.

It may not be as attractive as other spots.

If you want a 3* location that is just down the street and within sight of the Interlaken West station take a look at the Hotel Bernerhof, a Best Western property.