Ticino region - late October
 

Hi,

I am planning my honeymoon and thinking of going to Ticino region for 4 whole days during the last week of October. I will be coming from Bernese Oberland area. I am weighing in if I will stay in Lugano, Locarno or Ascona or maybe some other area? I will not be driving so I will just be relying on public transportation. I know this is not the best time to go to Switzerland but it is the only time I can go.

Which place do you is the best city/town to stay among the three? I love beautiful scenery and just walking around enjoying the view. I like to be able to have options to go to. Will the ferries and furnicular be operating at that time?

I understand that this is he off season for tourists. Does anybody know if all three places will be quiet and dead during that time or still very interesting?

Well, it looks a sort of joke, but as my honeymoon about 20 years ago, we had six days in Ascona in early October. I will be frank: Ticino is always rather quiet - let us make an exception for the Locarno film festival in August - and in October it will be rather dead. The liveliest place is usually Lugano - but "lively" in Switzerland means something much more tempered that in most places. I would say the only lively city in the whole country is Zurich that has nightlife, opera, concerts, jazz and so on.

We chose Ascona as we rented an apartment from a friend; we had a car and moving around was not an issue - we had day trips to Lucerne and Zurich, as at the time there were no big queues at Gotthard.
Ascona is the smallest of the three, it has a nice lakefront. As trains do not arrive there, it is not as well connected as Locarno and Lugano.

The climate in low areas of Ticino is very mild - they can grow palms in Ascona. This does not mean it can get occasionally cold (it has been snowing over all the region this weekend), and in October it can get damp and foggy.

If you plan to relax in very quiet places, it could be the place for you. If you think about spending your honeymoon partying, it is not your place.

I responded on your other thread with Ascona. No contest between the three in my opinion. Especially as it it your honeymoon, Ascona is far more romantic than the other two.

Hi spark219,

I visited Lugano some years ago and didn't care for it much. I was looking for a quiet place with lovely views, but Lugano was too much like a city for my tastes: lots of people crowding around, lots of traffic and smog, lots of noise. I think I was booked for 7 nights but left after 3 or 4.

I visited Locarno once during my stay, and it was more my style: smaller and more quiet. The lakeside promenade wasn't next to a busy road, as was the one in Lugano, though it wasn't very long.

I haven't visited Ascona though I really want to some day. We once had a close family friend who was from Switzerland and returned there for the decades before her death -- she adored Ascona and would only vacation there.

Have fun as you plan!

s

Thank you for your inputs. I am now considering either staying in Locarno or Ascona based on your recommendations. No one has mentioned that shops/restaurants/hotels close in Locarno/Ascona during late October, which I understand is Switzerland's "shoulder season". So does this mean that all shops and restaurants are open? This is important to me because I have experienced going to cities wherein it's quite dead during their off season when most shops and restaurants are closed.

Can anyone recommend a hotel with lake view?

Thanks once again!

Don't worry too much about "shoulder season". This is true about the mountains, not so much for Ticino. Hardly any hotels/restaurants will be closed.

Late October can be very nice in Ticino but can come with torrential rain also.

Ascona is the most romantic/picturesque place, but Locarno is not much behind and it is livelier and has better public transportation (the hub for the northern Lago Maggiore).

Recommendations for a hotel with lakeview depend on your budget. Since it's your honeymoon you might be up for a splurge, right? The Belvedere in Locarno is excellent, relatively quiet, but still central location, great views. In Ascona: There are several 3star hotels along the lake promenade.

Locarno would be my choice. We have always stayed at La Palma Au Lac. It is lakeside and a nice stroll to shopping and restaurants. The train station is very close as well.

Locarno and Ascona are both fine, Ascona probably more romantic, but I have to speak up for Lugano. It's not a traffic and smog-infested hellhole, it's not the LA-at-rush-hour of Switzerland. It DOES have lovely views and quiet parks, it has plenty of oases of serenity.

We've been there about 12 times in the last three years and if I thought the city was the same as Swandav describes, we certainly would not be going back. But we do return multiple times each year. Our next trip will be in late April/early May and we are looking forward to again having a wonderful time enjoying great food, strolling through the gardens and along quiet back streets and taking in the gorgeous vistas.

I stayed in Ascona and Lugano and think that either could be a lovely place to enjoy a romantic honeymoon. And FWIW, my experience of Lugano was like WeisserTee's.

Restaurants in the Ticino area are on the expensive side. A trick is having lunch at self-service restaurants in shopping malls. Coop and Manor in Lugano, Manor in Locarno.

lol! I can only say that I'm truly not making this up! That truly was my experience.

Perhaps it impacted me harder because I was comparing it to the lakeside promenade at Montreux -- which is separated from traffic by a thick wedge of buildings. That's the ambiance I was looking for -- quiet -- and I didn't find it in Lugano.

In addition, I was staying at a 5-star hotel (yes, I truly splurged for what I wanted), and the buildings were all so close together that I saw anyone could hop from balcony to balcony over 5 buildings or so and arrive at my own.

And, yes, I do remember just lots and lots of cars on that road next to the lake. Wish it weren't so.

s

@ swandav -- I don't doubt your experience at all -- it's just different than mine. FWIW, I just checked my photos and notes: My lake-facing hotel in Montreux was beside a VERY busy road; there was a narrow strip of "parkland" that separated the road from the lake, with a walkway near the lake. In Lugano, I walked a lake-front path in a strip of parkland, decorated with sculptures, that was to the lake side of a busy road. IME, the lake-side promenade in Montreux itself (not the walk from Montreux to the Chateau de Chilon) was noisier than the lake-side promenade in Lugano, but I'm sure that depends on the time of day and season....

Well, that's true -- the promenade around the dock/tourist information booth in Montreux is separated from the busy road only by a narrow strip. However, I guess I don't go there much. I tend to stay in the Territet/Veytaux area and walk around there and to Villeneuve. Quiet. When I walk to Montreux, I usually head up to the shopping/main street just before the Casino. Then I head back down to the lake at the Stravinski Auditorium to walk through Clarens, again quiet.

It sounds like your were at the Splendid or the Rouvenaz, right in the center of town.

One thing I love about Montreux is the length of the lakeside promenade, as it runs from Villeneuve to/past Chillon and to/through Montreux and through Clarens, about 8 or 9 km. Even though that one part of it is noisy and next to traffic, as you note.

But in Lugano, it wasn't that long. I sure didn't find any part of it in parkland with sculptures!

My hotel was the Castagnola, so I was walking into town from the east, if that helps to show what I found. And the taxi ride from the train station to the hotel did seem like rush-hour traffic.

Ah well.

Hopefully all of our experiences will help the op make this decision!

s

@ swandav -- you nailed it! In Montreux, I stayed at the Splendid and ate at Rouvenaz.

Too bad you missed the section of Lugano's waterfront by the Museo d'Art, with its interesting sculptures, or the section through the Parco Civico, with its lovely gardens.... But as you say, if it helps the OP, all the better! :-)

Oh, and lest I forget, there's the lovely Olive Grove Trail along the lakefront from just east of Lugano proper (from the suburb of Castagnola) to Gandriai....

make that "Gandria"

There is only one reason to prefer Lugano over Ascona. You haven't stayed in Ascona and don't know what you are missing.