I'm going to Switzerland at the beginning of May, and was wondering what you guys would recommend seeing/doing while I was there. I'll only be there for about 4 full fun days, and probably 2 half days with travel involved. I'll be taking the train in from another country, but should I rent a car when I get there? I thought about just staying in Zurich and using the day tours that depart from there to see the Alps/Lucerne/Interlaken. It's only about 1 1/2 hrs from Zurich to most of them.

But any hotels/high quality hostels/sights/must sees/info would be awesome. Is there still snow there in May?

[Edited on February 13, 2011 at 12:52 PM. Reason : .]

2/13/2011 12:31:48 PM

i went to switzerland in 2009 and stayed with friends in geneva. sounds like you're going to be in the more northern part of the country. all the stuff i did was from geneva as a home base so it may or may not work for you or interest you.

i took a day trip to lausanne (olympic museum)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lausanne

and monteaux (chateau de chillon)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montreux

i took the train everywhere, i dont think you need a rental car and it would probably be more hassle than its worth.

we also took a trip to the villars which is a little ski town. we went during the off season but there was still stuff to do

http://www.villars.ch/en/

definitely try fondue at some point. its delicious! and it's different than going to the melting pot btw

also switzerland doesn't export their wine so if you're into wine, try some just to do it and bring a few bottles home if you like it since it's definitely not something you can just get anywhere.


and if you have a nerd streak, you can tour CERN http://outreach.web.cern.ch/outreach/visites/index.html

i took a tour but i was too late for a "guided" tour so i got hooked up with a mutual friend of the friends i was visiting who works there and gave me a tour

2/13/2011 12:46:48 PM

The Matterhorn is pretty cool, there's a nearby town called Zermatt where you would take a train to get to the mountain.

Food is expensive there, so I'd recommend picking up sandwiches along the way at convenience stores like Coop. The food is great though, make sure to pick up as many soft pretzels as you can, try spaetzle and schnitzel.

2/13/2011 6:46:55 PM

Mount Pilatus and Lucerne was badass.

2/13/2011 7:57:44 PM

No need for a car. Switzerland has some of the best public transit in the world, Zurich especially.

I took the train from Interlaken up to the Jungfraujoch, and it was amazing.







I don't know how the rest of Switzerland is, but Bern was a bit annoying because everything seemed to shut down really early. I remember resorting to eating at a McDonald's one night because I couldn't find anything else open.

2/13/2011 8:03:13 PM

open up a bank account and wire all your monies there

2/13/2011 8:05:22 PM

interlaken is awesome

2/13/2011 8:29:43 PM

Schweizerdeutsch is like German with an Italian accent, and it drives me nuts trying to understand any of them.

2/13/2011 9:17:07 PM

A coworker of mine lived/stayed in Basel for a while and really enjoyed that area.

2/13/2011 10:23:38 PM

my wife and i went to switzerland and italy for our honeymoon...flew into zurich, drove to luzern and then to interlaken where we took the train/bus/gondola to gimmelwald

i wanted to hike speer, but we didn't have time...let me live vicariously through you

http://activityworkshop.net/hiking/switzerland/speer.html

2/14/2011 11:04:44 AM

Will there be snow in the Alps in May still?

2/17/2011 11:04:24 PM

is CERN worth visiting?

4/24/2011 11:55:20 PM

^^lol

4/24/2011 11:56:34 PM

^^ on its own merit as an interesting tourist location? probably not

because it's actually CERN and may one day bring about the destruction of our planet? probably

4/25/2011 7:50:38 AM