Hazelmn

We will be travelling to Switzerland in June, and our choices of airports are either Munich or Vienna. Most of our Switzerland time will be in the Bernese Oberland, Zurich, and Luzern.

My questions are two-fold:
1. Which of the two cities (Munich, Vienna) would be a better place to spend a day or two as we are flying in or out?
2. Is there is a substantial difference in getting to/from Zurich from those two cities?

Thanks!!

cls2paris

How do you plan to get to/from Munich or Vienna? If it is by train you might want to consider that Zurich to Vienna is 10+ hours and Zurich to Munich is 4-5 hours. I found this by checking train schedules at:
http://www.reiseauskunft.bahn.de/bin/query.exe/en

This is a great tool for researching train travel in Europe. I haven't used it to buy tickets before.

Hazelmn

Thanks for the link. We will indeed by travelling by train, and I had no idea of the distance between Vienna and Zurich. Thanks!

TXEER

I suggest Munich.

Vienna is a much larger city and one can easily spend a week there to see it all.

Munich, OTOH, has the feel of a smaller city. The people are Bavarian and are much friendlier than their snooty counterparts in Vienna. (Calm down PC police...just my opinion!)

Munich is a charming city and one to two days will give you a chance to see it. I suggest that you eat lunch at the Seehaus. Its located in the Englisher Gartens. And if you are looking for a great place to drink German beer...drop in on the Hofbraus Haus for a minute or two and then go to the Augustinerbrau Biergarten located near the Haupt Bhanhof...its where the real Germans go. The Hofbrau Haus is home to drunk American and Australian tourists.

Also be certain to climb the tower of St. Peters Kirche...great view of the Alps.

bob_brown

Let me reinforce an earlier post by saying that Vienna is indeed a long train ride from Zürich, which itself is more thasn 2 hours from the Berner Oberland and about an hour long train ride from Luzern.

Your best connection from Wien West to Zürich is 8 hours 50 minutes. From my experience, it is a long, tedious ride with frequent stops between Kufstein and Sargans. I did not do it all in one day; instead, I stopped in Salzburg for 3 nights before continuing.

I suggest Munich, although the Munich airport is about an hour from the central city. There are two ways to get there. My preference is the Lufthansa Bus. You can pay on the bus and your luggage goes underneath in luggage compartment, which is locked by the driver.

There is one stop, at the Nordfriendhof location, which is in the northern part of Schwabing, one of the main residential and commercial shopping districts of Munich. I prefer it to the central city and stay at the Hotel Astoria right in the heart of Schwabing just off of Leopoldstrasse, and close to U-Bahn lines.

From Munich to Zürich, you have about a 4 hour ride.
Depending on your schedule, you can take one of two no change connections. One leaves at 7:12; the other at 12:34.
There is a 3rd one at 16:24 arriving Zürich at 20:41, which is fairly late in the evening. However, in June the days are long and you will have daylight for most all of the trip.

There are many connections from Munich to Zürich which require changes of train along trhe way, with Stuttgart being a primary connection point.

Munich is an interesting city to visit with many museums, a good to excellent opera, and a quality orchestra.
The whole area is beautiful, and it is a worthy destination within itself.

If you are going to be doing much traveling around Europe I think you will profit greatly from learning to use a few key rail schedule websites.

My favorite is the Swiss site at www.sbb.ch, with captions in 4 languages including English. The German site for Die Bahn is located at http://bahn.hafas.de/bin/query.exe/d

It is in 5 languages and it is comprehensive for Western Europe as well as Austria and the Czech Republic. I have not tested it for Poland and other eastern European nations.

For Switzerland I like to use the Swiss site because it gives prices, schedules, and track numbers for the departing/arriving trains.

AisleSeat

Munich and Vienna are both charming and interesting places to visit but I think I would look at flying into Zurich unless you are just looking for a second location to visit. If that is the case, make it Munich. It is a fun city with lots to see, taste, and do.

WallyKringen

I suggest another look at the map and at flight schedules. There are six airports that beat Munich hands-down for getting to Switzerland - never mind Vienna which should not even be considered a candidate.

Train from Munich airport to Bern is 7 hours!

Train from Vienna Westbahnhof to Bern takes ten hours and more, not counting getting from the airport to the Westbahnhof.

That makes no sense. Why not fly into one of the three major international Swiss airports, ZRH Zurich or BSL Basel or GVA Geneva, even if it means changing planes somewhere in Europe to connect, with the same airline or a partner? Like United and Lufthansa etc. via FRA or MUC?

Lots of airlines fly from various gateways in the US into one or more of the above three Swiss airports non-stop, even more fly there with one stop, and often more cheaply:

Nonstop: AA, United, Continental, Swiss, others

One stop: AA, Iberia, Air Canada, United (into BSL via FRA), Alitalia, Air France, Northwest, KLM, Delta, others

And there's a whole other way of doing it, by making up your own combination, which can easily be done and can save you lots of money - like taking the cheapest flight into a London airport and taking a budget flight with another airline from the same (best-case) or another London airport to Switzerland.

Bern (and the nearby Interlaken region) is the most central location for the trip you seem to have in mind, so why not research flying all the way into Bern BRN airport, from London City, from Rome, from Munich, or from Lugano (not far from Milan). The Bern BRN website www.alpar.ch/modweb.php has the flight schedules as a downloadable .pdf called Flugplan.

If you can't fly into Bern, getting there from other airports is a breeze:

Trains from ZRH Zurich airport to Bern: As little as 1:15 hr, the trains leave from underneath the airport complex.

Bus from BSL airport into Basel SBB station takes 20 minutes, trains to Bern take as little as 58 minutes.

Trains from Geneva airport to Bern: As little as 1:50 hr, trains leave from underneath the airport complex.

Even flying into Milan beats Munich or Vienna - it takes less than 4 hours from Milano Centrale to Bern (although getting from Malpensa airport into Milano Centrale station is an hour by bus).

Or flying into Frankfurt (M) and taking the train from the airport's long-distance station (Fernbahnhof) underneath the airport would still beat Munich, it only takes four hours to get to Bern.

WK

Carolina

I would consider the world cup (football, or soccer in the USA)schedule when making your plans. Matches start around the 8th June and last until 9th July. There will be a lot of football fans all over Germany during this time.

bob_brown

Zürich Flughaven (airport) is an easy airport to use. So is the airport in Geneva.

Easy Jet flies into both Geneva and Basel.
However, the only airport near London that hosts flights from the USA and Easy Jet is Gatwick.

It might be just as cheap to book a flight directly to Zürich from any one of several US cities, or change along the way. The only airport I avoid at all costs is Charles de Gaulle. I have learned to dislike the place.

United has a non stop from Chicago to Zürich; so does Atlanta.
Newark has a flight on Continental and
JFK has one on United.

There are numerous connections from US cities to Zürich.

Train fares in Europe are not cheap, so you might want to consider the alternatives of flying directly to a Swiss city.

On the other hand, Munich is an interesting place to visit. I have been there several times, and always enjoy it.

Hazelmn

Thanks, all. I will consider using Continental to fly into Zurich or Geneva. I am a million-miler on Northwest, so I try to keep my business there, especially for the long flights. That is why I was going between Munich and Vienna. However, with Continental partnership, I have a few more options. I am also aware of the Delta partnership, but the terms are not as favorable for a Northwest flyer as they are on Cont.