travel info / Cost / advice required
 

Myself and my wife are budget travellers and we were wondering how much would it cost to travel to switzerland for five nights. We plan to visit between June 10 to June 16. We want to know the total cost of package - Hotel, Car Rental/Travel by train, Food, cost of visiting different places (entrance fee/ ferry tickets.... etc). We are interested in both nature and visit to some of the historic stuff.

We are both vegans and were wondering if we would get enough vegan food there.

Let us also know which places to visit.

Also we are both from India so wondering if there is any racism out there.

Thanks for your help
Tony

I humbly suggest you start this planning by BUYING a guidebook.

Dear tony,

We are not travel agents.

If you have specific questions regarding your proposed itinerary, hotels, restaurants, etc, we shall be glad to help.

This link for air fares might help you:

http://www.bookingbuddy.com/?source=...=BBSearch_Home

We have our tickets covered. We are Indian living in San Francisco for past seven years. We are traveling to India from San Francisco and planning to take a break journey in Zurich.

Our budget for those 5 days is $1500 all inclusive.

Let us know if we can make it. I don't want to cut corners during the trip. Would rather save more money for next year if you feel it is gonna cost more.

How about racism ?

Is knowing the local language must or we can do with English.

We have green cards. Would we still need visa ?

Tony

You don't need a visa for a short stay in Switzerland (look up www.swissemb.org) if you have a US Green card. Note that only the physical card is accepted and not stamps in your passport.

Vegan food is not a problem. You will find Indian restaurants even at Jungfraujoch. Zurich has several Indian and veggie-friendly eateries.

As for racism towards the brown-skinned - it is not at all an issue in Switzerland. The Swiss love tourists and know how to make you part with your money.

Know that Switzerland is not a cheap proposition. Zurich is VERY expensive for a visitor, far more expensive than Silicon Valley. $1500 for 5 days will probably be okay for a budget vacation assuming you can find hotels for about $100 a night. In Zurich, that will mean a two-star hotel in summer - clean and efficient, but not much more. Also consider buying a second-class Swiss Pass. That ought to take care of all your travel needs.

I suggest you buy The Lonely Planet Guide for Switzerland and take a stab at charting your programme. You could then refine it further by asking specific questions here.

Rajan

It seems that at least SOME racism is acceptable here, based on the rude replies you have received here thus far. Typically you should expect to receive better treatment here than this. You will probably receive better treatment than this in Switzerland. You would receive somewhat better treatment than this in rural southern Indiana where I live, although it is not hard to find racism directed at many kinds of "non-white" people.

I am prejudiced too - - against Switzerland - - and I have said so here before and I have been sharply chided for it. I think that it is an overpriced country which is far less interesting to me than its four other ("major") Alpine neighbours:; France, Italy, Austria and Germany (I exclude Liechtenstein, since it is a pseudo-country which might as well be Switzerland).

You WILL have to cut corners SOME to enjoy Switzerland on $1500 for two people for five days/nights. You would also have to cut SOME corners to enjoy SF and the Bay Area on $1500 for two people for five days/nights. I just did that, and the cutting of corners was quite painless. Our rooms of $159 at the Sheraton Fisherman's Wharf were $74 on Priceline. I see other comparable hotels for Zurich at similar prices on Priceline (based on biddingfortravel.com but I do not know how difficult they are to get).

Or you can travel by train to a town like Interlaken, Thun or Weggis - - just to name three - - for under $100 and find a room for under $100 a night as well. Of these three places, Weggis is the only I know well, personally - - it is across the lake from Lucerne, and it offers most of the wonders of this area at close to half the price for lodging, compared to Lucerne.

That leaves you $900 for attractions and meals; even if you managed to spend $300 ($30 per person times five days) on boats, admissions, etc., you still have $600 - - or $60 per person per day for meals. You barely have to cut corners on that budget - - while meals will be somewhat more expensive than in San Francisco, they are not more than 20-30% more. So, unless you want to start including expensive wines, you will do fine.

I do not know a lot about vegan dining, but it is inevitably there if you go looking for it. a one-minute search on Yahoo led me, for example, to these three restaurants in Zurich: Handi (Indian/Pakistani), Pot au Vert (Vegetarian/Swiss) and Taj Palace (Indian/Pakistani).

If you have other choices for your five day stopover en route to India (Paris, Rome, Ansterdam just to name three that come to my mind), I would personally recommend them - - though admittedly, a budget in any of those three could run 50% less to 50% more than in Zurich.

Hope this info helps you get started in making your plans.

Best wishes,

Rex

Just returned from a trip to Europe which included Switzerland. We found the language to be a difficulty and all information places closed. The resturants where we ate, which were in small towns, did not have menus and no one spoke English. We found the only place to use toliets was at the railway stations which is good for anyone traveling in Europe to know. However the country is beautiful and I'm happy I went. It was necessary to purchase a 40 Swiss Frank sticker to drive there. We paid 125 both nights for our room.

Rex: unless there are posts that have been deleted I'm trying to figure out what you are talking about.

I think if you stick to smaller towns and stay in pensions or private homes you could get by quite well. They are all strictly regulated, and what gets a two star there would probably rate a three anywhere else. Also, we saved money many years ago (Switzerland has always been more expensive than a lot of other countries) by buying food at grocery stores and having picnics--so much glorious scenery for picnicking.

Rex, I too am wondering.

I thought that the first two replies were dismissive and snotty. I don't think that this question is any more indicative of "laziness" or not knowing to read books than many other questions asked by inexperienced travelers.

And so I inferred that since the questioner mentioned being of Indian origin that the inherent rudeness of saying "go look it up yourself" amounted to a racist attitude.

Maybe I over-reacted.

As I have been told many times before, if all you have to say is to "put down" the question from a newbie, then why bother to answer at all?

Tony,

Before this post denigrates into sniping and other such tomfoolery, I also suggest checking out the Rough Guide to Switzerland. It will have lots of options for budget-minded travel. The Lonely Planet suggestion is good as well.

Tony: Racism?I don't think so.The first 2 posters gave you good advice.Give people a better idea of what you are trying to do and you will usually get plenty of useful info.

Tony

In my experience Europeans in general tend to be better informed about India and Indian culture and customs. More often than not they had seen more of India than I had and have lots of questions.

As for racism, have never experienced overt racism either here in the US or elsewhere on my travels - does it exist? probably. In my experince if you go worrying about racism - especially in countries where you don't speak the local language you are more likely to see it even in unintended situations.

Get a good guide learn basic phrases, show pride in your heritage. If you have been here for 7 years - think you'll find your experience is not better or worse. Have Fun!!