We are flying into heathrow early october. Want to see Switzerland for 4 or 5 days before returning to London. What is the best way to get to Oberland area from Heathrow by trains? We arrive at Heathrow at 5:30pm and would like to leave immediately for Lucerne or Interlaken. Is it too far to do the same day, or should we only plan to go part way that evening? Is it better to go via Paris or is there a more direct route on the trains to Zurich or Berne? Any idea how many hours this takes?

Hello robinski,<BR><BR>The best way to get to the Oberland from London is definitely not by train. The trip from London to Paris is about four hours, then from Paris to Luzern is seven more hours, or Paris to Interlaken is six more hours. You can check the train schedules at www.eurstar.com and www.rail.ch.<BR><BR>I think you should look into flying between London and Zurich. Easy jet (www.easyjet.com) offers flights from Gatwick to Zurich for about 15 GBP up to 46 GBP; the trip is about two hours. Then the train from Zurich to Luzern is an hour or from Zurich to Interlaken is about three hours. <BR><BR>If you’re flying from the US, you might think about flying open-jaw into London and out of Zurich, then use Easyjet to get to Switzerland for the second part of your vacation. Otherwise, you’ll land in Heathrow jet-lagged and have to hassle with getting your luggage and transferring to Gatwick for an evening flight to Zurich. Then you’ll either have to waste a night in Zurich (arriving too late to enjoy the city and leaving early the next morning) or take a night train to Luzern or Interlaken and arrive around midnight. <BR><BR>Much better, I think, to fly into Heathrow and stay four or five days in London, then fly from Gatwick to Zurich and take the train to Luzern or Interlaken. Then fly back to the US out of Zurich. <BR><BR>Hope this helps,<BR><BR>s<BR>

I think your best route would be via Lille - Paris - Lausanne - Bern. Would assume this itinerary will take 6-8 hours (includes connections). Interlaken will be easiest to reach via Bern; for Lucerne, you should continue on to Zurich from Bern before changing for Lucerne. <BR><BR>In any event, try something else than Lucerne or Interlaken (they are the typical tourist destinations). Stay in Bern for a day or two, it's a very interesting old-town city. If the weather's nice, then hop on a train for Grindelwald or Wengen (you'll go via Interlaken...) to get up into the Alps. Lucerne is OK, it's sort of everything in one, but if you want to be in the mountains, you should continue down the Vierwaldstattersee (the lake) toward Brunnen - or, go up the Rigi mountain by funicular train.

Take the train from London to Paris (3hrs-4hrs) and then change and take a train from Paris to Lausanne (4hrs).<BR><BR>Stay in Lausanne or either the nearby small town of Vevey or the swanky town of Montreux. Then take the train over to Interlaken or Lucerne.<BR><BR>But if I were you I would fly as it is cheaper and quicker. Getting to Switzerland by train is not much fun as you have to use the Paris metro and the whole trip takes the best part of a day and is not very scenic until Lausanne.

Getting into LHR at 5:30 PM and trying to travle straight to Switzerland by train is not realistic. You land at 5:30, perhaps get through immigration by 6:30 (if you are lucky), need about an hour to get to the train at Waterloo where you must be at least 30 mins before your train because you will go through a security screening just like at airports. Then the 3.5 hour trip to Paris but add and hour for the time change. so at the VERY most opptimistic you will arrive in Paris at 1:00 AM - and will have been traveling for about 20 to 24 hours straight.<BR><BR>So you have a few choices: Do London first and after a few days take the train or fly to Switzerland, <BR><BR>OR fly directly to Switzerland from the US and then travel to London for the 2nd half of your trip,<BR><BR>OR do the reverse - fly to London and return from Switzerland. <BR><BR>In only 10 days you don't want to spend the best part of two full days traveling to/from Switzerland from London.

I Agree with the last post. See London first and then Switzerland. Or Fly to Zurich and then out to London. <BR><BR>We just returned from a trip. Flew into London, 3 days in London, Flew to Paris, Day trip in Paris, Overnight to Zurich and on to St. Moritz , 6 days in Switzerland overnight to Paris and back to London for a day and out to the USA. Worked perfect for us until ran into a Pilot strick in Paris so had to book on the EuroStar into London. Loved every minute of it <BR><BR>JR