I am an indian having family of four. Me , my wife , my son (16 y/o) and daughter (4 y/o). I am travelling to france and switzerland in may.2014. I would like to have suggestions about the best and the most economical way to travel these 2 countries. Train or rent-a-car ? I have never been to europe before. Pls suggest.
Posted by
Green Bay
21107 posts
The answer to all questions is, depends. To start, you should look at what your train options are. You can see all the schedules at www.bahn.com. This is the German rail site, but they have everybody's schedules loaded on their computer and is very easy to use. To purchase tickets online for France and from France to Switzerland, use the French rail website, http://en.voyages-sncf.com/en/?DISTRIBUTED_COUNTRY=GB.
In Switzerland itself, use www.sbb.ch.
In France, a car may be handy to visit more out of the way places. If you purchase train tickets well in advance and can commit to nonrefundable, non exchangeable tickets their are big discounts available on fast long distance trains. One problem I see, is that traveling with a family of 4, this sometimes exceeds the limited number of deep discounts available and then just a moderate discount is available.
In Switzerland, depending on what journeys you wish to take, some sort of pass may be warranted. For instance, if you want to take the scenic mountain top trains like the Jungfraujoch, A Half Fare Card would help. The straight passes are very expensive and hard to make pay, but the Half Fare Card almost always saves money. You can pick up a Swiss Family Card at no cost, and your youngest will travel free.
Look at the details at:
http://www.sbb.ch/en/leisure-holidays/holidays--short-breaks-in-switzerland/swisstravelsystem.html
There are always a few tricks when doing research. For instance, when you look at ticket prices on the Swiss site, the price displayed is the "half fare" price. If you don't have a Half Fare Card, the actual price is double that.
If you sketch out your proposed itinerary, people here will be happy to comment. The thing to do now is research where you want to go and what you want to see.