We're planning a very last minute trip in a few weeks to Europe. We'll be arriving in Paris and staying there for 3 days. From there we're heading to Venice but would like to find somewhere to spend a day in Switzerland. I've seen pictures of Lugano online and read about it and that seems like a nice place to stay.

So, would that be somewhere good to stay between Paris & Venice? Would we be able to take an overnight train to Lugano? Will it be easy enough to get to Venice from Lugano via train?

According to the timetables at www.bahn.de, there are two routes that include night trains. One is Paris-Milano-Lugano and the other is Paris-Mannheim-Lugano.

Yes, you can easily get from Lugano to Venezia Santa Lucia by train.

To see for yourself, go to the DB site and click on the drop-down flag menu for English. After you get summary timetables for Paris-Lugano, click on the arrow to the left of each departure time to see the connecting points. Do the same for Lugano-Venezia Santa Lucia.

Hi jw713,

The fast train TGV runs from Paris to three points in Switzerland: Zürich/Basel, Geneva/Lausanne, and Bern.

The Bern stop would be closest to the high Alps. You could either stay right in Bern for one or two nights and take a day-trip to see the peaks, or continue on for about another 90 minutes and stay in a village right in the Alps.

You can get information on this area at these sites

www.myjungfrau.ch

www.berninfo.com

Lugano and Lake Lugano is not really in the high Alps; it is very close to the Italian lakes area of Como, and has a lot of that influence. If you wanted to go there, you would take the train to Basel and continue from there.

You can get really excellent fares if you book your train tickets about 89 days early -- these discount fares are as low as 35 chf, but they sell out quickly. You can research all these train routes & fares at the Swiss rail site,

www.rail.ch

Have fun!

s

If you decide to stay in Lugano, then here is how to get the cheapest train fares for each route:

1. Book the Paris-Milano night train ASAP at www.tgv-europe.com. To keep the site in English and to keep from being bumped to the Rail Europe site which doesn't offer discount fares, choose Great Britain as both your country of residence and the country in which you will retrieve your tickets. You can pick up the tickets at any SNCF station or boutique in France, even though you originally chose Great Britain. Buy your Milano-Lugano tickets when you get to Milano.

2. Book both Paris-Mannheim and the Mannheim-Lugano night train at www.bahn.de. (Do separate bookings for each leg to get the best fares.)

cheap to fly to Milan <125.00USD then train to Venice

Thanks so much for the help. I was starting to think about a flight but I like TimS suggestion of the train (and thanks for the tip on how to find the discount prices).

The first class price of $140 euro seems very reasonable (and is probably cheaper than a flight). The only thing I can't figure out is would we get a sleeper car? Do we need 1st class to get a sleeper car or would 2nd class give that too?

For the two of you your choices are 4- and 6-bunk couchettes in which you would share the couchette with strangers or a 2-bed sleeper. A double sleeper would be 1st class.