jill_h

Hi all. To come up with Plan B, I'd like to get your ideas of where to go from Zurich (where we will be flying into). We were going to Lauterbrunnen for 5 nights (I'm holding out hope!), then to Venice, Cinque Terre, Rome and Sicily. IF we can't do Lauterbrunnen, what ideas do you have? I'm not interested in Florence on this trip; have done Bavaria, Nice and Paris; and there are no other places on my "must see" list right now. Not a huge fan of art, don't need nightlife, we enjoy the outdoors - easy biking/hiking, beautiful scenery and architecture. Thanks for any suggestions.

swandav2000

Hi jill_h,

I think you should think about some other areas of Switzerland --

1. The Engadin (www.engadin.ch), or the area from Scuol to St Moritz in the eastern section. This is an untouristed but beautiful area (some folks say that the Berner Oberland doesn't have the best mountains, only the best PR!). Some towns to research would be Guarda, Scuol, St Moritz, Sils, Silvaplana, & Pontresina (you could start with a text search here, and look for posts from Ingo -- or better yet, here are his pages at Virtual Tourist http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/4166c/a8885/ and http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/4166c/a88f9/). This area is FULL of hiking & biking trails, lakes, and peaks. From this area, you can take the Bernina Express over to Tirano and on to Milan.

2. The Jura, an area I haven't seen yet, in the far western part of the country. Start with Basel (about an hour from Zurich airport), then move south to Saint-Ursanne, Solothurn, Biel (lots of vineyards to explore), Neuchatel, and Murten.

3. The Saanenland, and area I'm just beginning to explore, in the far western part of the Berner Oberland. The towns are Gstaad (www.gstaad.ch), Saanen, Chateau d'Oex (www.chateau-doex.ch) and Rougemont. The mountains aren't as high as the BO, but the rolling hills go on forever; it's just paradise! Again, there are about a hundred walking and biking paths going in all directions. Here's a link to my photo album from my trip there last year (also to Montreux), with one bike ride: http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/swanda.../ph//my_photos

Hope this helps! Let me know if you'd like more info on any of these.

s

Nidwaldner_Chris

Zermatt combined with the Montreux/Gryon area might be nice. You could visit Chateau Chillon via a stroll along the lake. Or go to Chamonix. All these places offer hiking/walking and beautiful scenery. In fact this is the alternative I'm suggesting to my friend who was also supposed to be going to Lauterbrunnen in the next few weeks.

I believe that train travel into the Engadin will be hampered for a while since the train route from Zurich to Chur has been affected.

jill_h

Thanks! Swandav2000 - I checked out your pis -- WOW. That will definitely be an option.

Chris - sounds like a good option. All of our travel was to be on train, so this has definitely mucked our plans, but i'm holding out hope that the Swiss will prevail and get their beautiful country cleaned soon.

Any more ideas?

visper

We had the same plan to spend 2 nights in LAuterbrunnen next week but made alternate plans. We're going to head to Lake Geneva area and stay in Villars. Been there but never stayed there, but looked great.

sunstar

I was scheduled to stay in Grindlwald in less than one week from today, but do to some of the negative reports I have gotten from friends in Switzerland and the negative reports I heard from the Grindlewald tourist office, I will drop Grindlewald and do Zermatt and Saas Fee this year.

Now in all probability, things might be better there in a few days, then again perhaps they will not be better. I just did not want to spend a week there sitting in the hotel reading or watching TV.

As of this time, there are no certainties that things will be significantly better in the next few days.I heard from a report here that the trains are operating in the Lauterbrunnen area again. This totally contradicts what I heard from someone I spoke with in Switzerland. So, uncertainities!!!

Another thing that lead to my dropping Grindlewald was the wet conditions on the hiking trails. High mountain trails can be very dangerous after many days of heavy rains. You all might remember when several hikers were killed in the Grosse Scgheidegg area above Switzerland after those mountains were pelted with rain.

As of now, I think I have made the wise decision. We shall see.

kappa

Just FYI, I just had Lucerne tourist office on the phone at 12.00 local time. I was told, main roads to Lucern city is closed, large part of the old town is under water, eg, Schwanenplatz has 50 centimeter water. It just does not recede at the moment.

Intrepid1

I would agree as to areas on the shore of Lac Leman including Montreux for Chillon, perhaps Morges, Vevey and Lausanne; even the possibility of a trip up to Zermatt for views of the Matterhorn and possible hiking (assuming the rail links along the Rhone aren't flooded out as well).

Another area might be around Lake Constance/St. Gallen/Appenzell again if the floods haven't affected rail travel.

Nidwaldner_Chris

I just read a report that the Engadin was also affected quite badly particularly Susch and Scuol.