Hubby and I are in the planning stage for a 10 day trip to Switzerland next Spring or Summer 2002 and he dropped a bomb on me!! He says he only wants to use one city as a homebase and make only day trips from there. We've often done this in larger European cities but this sounds impossible to see several regions in a whole country!! Is there such a city that would make a central homebase to afford visits to Lucerne, Monteux, Bernese Oberland areas...still returning back each night??

If you want to see the Berner Oberland, and only that, then you could select one place as a home base. Otherwise you will spend half of your vacation sitting on a train, or in a car. <BR> <BR>True Switzerland is a small country, but the trip from Interlaken to Geneve, for example, is 3 hours, plus 3 hours back. <BR> <BR>If you decided you wanted to go from Interlaken to Zermatt, figure on the same length of time, 3:11 to be exact.

From BTDT, Luzern is 3-4 hours max driving time to almost any point in CH. <BR> <BR>To confirm this, I pulled out the Hallwag road map of CH w/it's "distoguide" - highlight a city and it gives your road distances to other towns/cities in the country. <BR> <BR>From eyeballing the map and using the "ditoguide", Luzern is as close to the E-W center of CH as you can get. 282km from Geneva and 234km to Sta. Maria in the SE. N-S it is biased towards the North by ~100km. <BR>hth, <BR>mj

First, it's a wonderful country, but a small one. I'm not sure the square miles work out exactly right, but I've always thought of it as roughly equivalent to New Jersey ... a lot more interesting, mind you, but roughly the same size. <BR> <BR>That said I don't know that I'd want to "do the country" for two weeks from a single base. Too much time spent in transit. And while virtually all of the country is attractive in one way or another, it's not all equally so. <BR> <BR>Do bear in mind that while the country is small there are relatively few Autobahns (or Motorways, the equivalent of Interstates). Compared to France or Germany, for example, you'll spend much more time on two lane highways. And you'll have mountains and lakes to contend with. It will take you longer to get from A to B than you will think from just looking at a map casually. <BR> <BR>The Luzern area makes a decent central base for car travel. But consider train travel. If hubby really wants to travel every day, the rail system is one way to take some of the stress out of it. In that case, though, you'd want a base that's a good rail hub, which Luzern is not. Bern would be better, and we'd favor Zürich ourselves ... while not central, the rail service is outstanding. <BR> <BR>You can plot prospective rail trips using one of the best of the European rail servers at www.rail.ch That will give you an idea of what you can cover in a reasonable period of time. Auto travel will usually be a bit faster, though sometimes actually slower. <BR> <BR>For some ideas of traveling the country by car, you'll find www.twenj.com/swissbycar.htm of interest. And you'll find there lots of links to other pages and sites of interest.

Thank You. I'm about to BRAIN my husband, but other than that....I could probably convince him to at least split the trip in 1/2 with 5 days in one home base and 5 days in another. Perhaps, 5 days in Berne makes sense....then maybe 5 days somewhere further south ????? Then before flying home, spend the last night in Zurich to be near the airport. <BR> <BR>How's this sound? With this in mind...if we use Berne for 5 nights, which city is centrally located with good train system for the 2nd five nights? I don't think we're as interested in going north or northwest/northeast but more interested in going south/southeast/southwest from Lucerne. Thanks! Tommi

First let me suggest that you consider using a rental car. We have had a rental three times in Switzerland and found that it enabled us to get to various destinations more quickly when compared to the train, and we could travel on our timetable. Also, we went to places that were in locations that were relatively remote. A bus might have gone there, but by the time we figured out which one it was, it would have taken much longer. <BR> <BR>For example, one of the most spectacular drives you can find is the so-called "Three Pass Drive" that takes one over the Grimsel, Furka, and Susten Passes. <BR>I know a bus goes to the top of the Grimsel Pass, but I am not sure which one goes over the others. We drove over the passes in easy stages, and we were treated to some eye popping scenery. We stopped where we wanted to stop and visited places we might not have had time to see had we been on a bus. I know we would not have found the bakery in Innertkirchen that we decided was the best one so far in all of Switzerland. {limited sample of course} <BR> <BR>Second, why not decide first what you want to see in Switzerland and then select your base of operations? <BR>In 1998 we decided that priority one was the Berner Oberland. Therefore, we rented an apartment in Lauterbrunnen for a week and wandered out from there. <BR>Initially we concentrate on the Berner Oberland itself, but for two days we took day trips to various places in the region. <BR> <BR>Bern is indeed a logical choice for visiting quite a few places in western and west central Switzerland, including Basel, Fribourg, and Neuchatel. I think you could even visit Lausanne, Montreux, and possibly Geneva from there. On the other hand, Bern is still a 90 minute trip from Grindelwald or Lauterbrunnen. And from there you need to ride something else to get "up into the hills". <BR>Also, something else you might want to consider is this: In the spring many of the mountain villages such as Mürren are essentially operatisng at half speed or less. The ski season is over and the summer push has not started. May is often a month of vacation for the people in the tourist business, and needed repairs and maintenance are often performed then. I would look to go in very late May at the earliest unless your main targets are the various cities and the non mountain areas. <BR> <BR>Regardless of where you decide to stay, I still feel that you should first decide what you to see. Then select your accommodations.

Tommi, <BR>Lovely thread; you're dealing with a win-win situation. One can't really go wrong in Switzerland (imho). <BR> <BR>My advice is to, first, spend at least a day wandering through Ed's website (he has offered his web address); it's a great starting point and introduction to the country. <BR> <BR>Next, as Bob Brown suggests, decide where you want to go (and Ed's web site will help a lot there). But instead of tackling this with geography, make this decision by understanding what Switzerland offers. If you want the best of Switzerland, base yourself smack-dab in the mountains in Muerren, Wengen, or Grindelwald. There are plenty of alpine walks and excursions to Interlaken, Luzern, and Berne to keep you busy for five or six days, then you get to come home to the best views in the world every night! If you prefer a city setting with the mountains as backdrops, base yourself in Luzern. You'll spend a few days exploring the old town and the major sights in town, and also be able to do day-trips to the villages of Wengen and Muerren. If you want a peaceful country setting with mountains as backdrops, consider Weggis or Vitznau on Lake Luzern -- but you'll probably need a car to do your excursions conveniently with this option. <BR> <BR>All of these, of course, offer the German side of Switzerland. For the second phase of the trip, consider a base either in the French portion of Switzerland (Vaud, Freiburg, and part of the Valais) or the Italian section (the Ticino). My personal favorite is Montreux on Lake Geneva; if you want a detailed list of events/activities there, e-mail me or do a text search on Montreux here. If you decide to stay in Montreux, you can fly home from Geneva rather than Zurich and save yourself (and your husband) one move. <BR> <BR>s

Good morning,, Tommi <BR>Would personally pick Interlaken as a <BR>central hub for two weeks in CH. <BR>You are 30 mins from Grindelwald and <BR>Lauterbrunnen to take in the Berneroberland. Also you have the lakes of Thun and Brienze, the towns around it <BR>and also Ballenberg. <BR>You are just less than two hours to Luzern, from there you , you have one hour additioinal to Zurich. you have <BR>mmediate acess to Mt. Rigi, Pilatus and <BR>Titlis and well as Luzern and Lake Lucerne with its boats.. <BR>You are less than an hour to Bern/.... <BR>You are about 3 hours from INterlaken Ost to Montreauix via Zweisimmen. <BR>You are about 3hr15min to Zermatt <BR>to its cableways and Gornergrat... <BR>You have two railroad stations in Interlaken, Interlaken Est and Ost, they <BR>are connected by a five minute railride, <BR>and you have a large assortment of hotels. <BR>You will have a lot of rail and watere travel and would strongly purchase a 15 day Swiss Pass....Richard of LaGrange Park, Il..

Just back from a three week two centre holiday in Switzerland. If it has to be tem days and one base I would go for Interlaken or around. Have a great time !

Tommi, have you made any progress with your planning? By now I'm sure you've found all sorts of interesting letters about favorite Swiss places. As someone said, you can't go wrong in Switzerland. Staying in one place for the entire trip sounds very restful, so perhaps you might want to stick with that plan and save the places you can't reach for another trip. From past experience, I can tell you that one trip to Switzerland won't be enough. Now having said that, I'd like to suggest dividing the trip into two 5-nighters. I'd say Lucerne (the city or the lake) and somewhere on the Lavaux side of Lac Leman (there are beaucoup messages about the delights of Montreux and its vicinity). I don't know if you mentioned that you'd be using a Swiss Pass (that miracle pass for boats, buses, and trains, and some city transportation too!) But if you will be using the train system (check the SBB site for times between cities), you really would be able to see many, many gorgeous places from those two bases. Personally, I don't feel that time on a Swiss train is time lost. (If you do, then ignore my letter entirely.) From Lucerne it is indeed possible to train to as far away as Lugano (a long day, but a lovely route). From Montreux or nearby, there are so many wonderful places to visit that I don't know where to start (see the numerous letters filled with suggestions). Berne is an easy day-trip, just in case you can't fit it into your Lucerne stop. The SBB site is great, because you can 'test' various day-trips to see how much time you'll need and how many train changes you'll have to make. May I mention one more thing? We always stay in small towns or villages with rail connections; but doing so does add to our time on the trains, because we usually have to make a change in a nearby city (hub). It's worth it to us because we love coming home at night to a quiet small place. If you are happy to stay in a city like Lucerne or Lausanne (both beautiful places), it will streamline your days out a bit. Continued good luck and great pleasure from your planning. It's part of the fun, isn't it? jw