First-time trip to Italy/Switzerland, family travel questions

Even after many trips, I plan by writing out each day. I find that helps me visualize the transport part especially. Just as a quick mental math, if you are not giving each place at least three days, you are not giving each enough time. With two weeks, I'd choose no more than four places.
A couple quick notes:
Renting a car in one country and dropping it in another means a large fee--I've seen a few to several hundred dollars. The train system in Switzerland is the best in the world and part of the experience really. In Italy, travel by train except in rural areas. Italy and Switzerland are well linked by train.
For now, just keep reading and narrowing down your list.
It's too early to book, but start doing searches of airfare to get a sense of pricing and schedules.

Just review the posts from the last several months here on the Forum under the countries in which you are interested. You are in luck! There's a wealth of practical info already posted. Many of your questions have already answered. Do take into account the summer heat, which can be daunting. Stay at least three nights in each location. SFO has many options for direct flights. Book hotels soon, as there's a lot of COVID pent-up demand. Use public transportation.
Have a great trip.

The reason to look at planned tours is (wait for it) they are planned tours! Which means they've done enough research already to have decided what their clients will want to see and do. In other words, this is the stuff most people want. So, frankly, you copy and paste from each tour what sounds good to you.

Or you hire a travel agent and give them your long list, there is no crime in paying someone to provide a service.

Any interest in a cruise? Want a yes or no prior to drafting a long response. When our sons were that age we found cruises to be the most economical and convenient. Solved a lot of logistic problems especially for first time visitors.

Second, you are little behind the curve for this summer's planning. However, you can catch up. Hit you local library and check out travel DVDs and guidelines for the areas of interests. Spend a couple of evening watch DVDs. You need to build a little background so you can better judge what works for you.

Do you have your passports?

First of all, as you are first-time travelers to Europe, I strongly urge you to use trains to get around, rather than rent a car. There are many potential pitfalls involved in driving in Italy, included the dreaded ZTLs. You can’t have a car in Venice, and you don’t want to try to drive one in Florence. The trains are easy and comfortable. And Switzerland encourages visitors to use their wonderful train system for the sake of the environment. Your son will travel for free on Swiss trains, boats, and high mountain lifts if the adults get a Swiss Travel Pass and request a free Family Pass.

A typical itinerary would start in Venice. You should be able to get good flights from San Francisco. Spend 3-4 nights in Venice, then head to Florence. Spend 2-3 nights there, or more if you want to do daytrips from there. Or move to a smaller town like Lucca, a walled city with a nice bike path on top of the walls.

Then take the train north to Milan, the starting point for most train routes into Switzerland. Many of these involve a ride on a fast train through a tunnel under the Alps, but I will suggest 2 alternatives that offermuch nicer scenery, and take you right to a nice place for your first stop in SwitzerlNd.

From Florence, it is a 2-hour journey by direct train ( no changes on the way) to Milan. Unless you have something you wish to see there, I suggest you change trains there to one going to Locarno in Switzerland. This is a nice lakeside town where you can relax, swim in the lake, or take a boat ride if you like. Spend a night or two, then take one of the trains that goes directly to Luzern (no changes on the way) over the Gotthard Pass. The train is named the Treno Gottardo and takes 3 hours for the journey to Lucerne, enjoyable every bit of the way.

Or, instead of going to Locarno, you could head to Lugano, another Swiss lakeside town. There you can ride a train over the same Gotthard Pass, but the route ends at Flüelen on a lake in SwitzerlNd, and you ride a boat up the lake to Luzern. This train is the Gotthard Panorama Express and only runs once a day.

https://www.gotthard-panorama-express.ch/en/

Luzern is a pretty town with nice hotels, lakeside promenade, a swimming beach, and a transport museum that is popular. If you haven’t ridden a boat to get here, you might like the Rigi roundtrip loop by boat, cogwheel train, and cablecar up the nearby mountain named Rigi. This route is fully covered with the Swiss Pass. Whatever you choose to do in Luzern, you will want 2nights here.

From Luzern, it is a nice train ride on the scenic Golden Pass route to Interlaken, where you transfer to a local train to Lauterbrunnen or one of the higher villages above the valley. This are of the Berner Oberland is most peoples’ favorite part of Switzerland. I will leave it to others to name all the sights and activities on offer—we are strictly hikers so I have not explored them all. You will likely want 3-4 nights here.

After that, it depends on how much time you have, so I will stop here. With this itinerary you could fly out of Zurich, or Geneva if you prefer, to see that area as well. It’s all good.

Here is a map of the Swiss rail system to help you visualize the routes:

https://cdn-doc.myswissalps.com/docs/default-source/rail-network-maps/swisstravelpass.pdf?sfvrsn=7788603a_56

With three weeks you could give yourself a week in each country, Switzerland, Italy and France.
If I were taking such a trip, I think I would start in Switzerland for a number of reasons. You have a choice of airports for arrival, Geneva, Bern, or Zurich. You will likely be exhausted after the long haul from SFO and will need a couple of days to acclimate. I would think about staying in one of the lake towns, for example Lausanne if you land in Geneva, Lucerne if you land in Zurich, or Zurich itself. Bern is not on a lake but as the Capital it has good transport links to the rest of Switzerland.

Depending where you end up in Switzerland you can either head to Italy or France. Trains will be your best friend and Swiss trains seem to go through the most stunning views.

Train travel in Italy is excellent and the high speed trains whisk you to and from major cities in a lot less time than negotiating Italian cities in a car. For example it’s a 2.5 hr hour trip from the middle of Milan to the middle of Venice with no changes or about 3.5 hours with a changeof trains.

France, you might want to rent a car particularly if you want to explore the Provence area.

Ideas for your son. Switzerland. Lake boat trips, riding a gondola to the top of a mountain. Chocolate tour. France. Canoeing on the Dordogne River in Provence. Exploring the Lascaux caves and associated museums. Italy. Turin, near to Milan is a good bet for interesting things to do. Car manufacture tours - Fiat. Also chocolates. A pasta cooking class….up to your elbows in flour and water! Further south look for pizza making classes. Venice riding the vaporettos, beach day at the Lido, visit to the gondola workshop. Rowing class. Gelato everywhere! In Tuscany think about visiting an agrotourismo, a stay on a working farm…cute animals! Often pools and cooking classes.

Get good guidebooks from the library . Rick Steves, Frommers, Lonely Planet, Blue Guide, Rough Guide. Goggle is your best friend ….use it!. Also get good maps of the counties, will help a lot to know the geography of where you want to go.

Useful travel sites : trains. Rome2rio.com. general info. italiatren.com. Website for main Italian train system. italiarail.com. Italy’s other train system. Don’t for get to use Italian names for destinations..Milano, Torino etc.

Planning really is half the fun, get the family involved, especially the son…happy son = happy parents!

I would Avoid slaloms and backtracking.

Since you want to see Tuscany, and I assume you are not interested in the industrialised areas, a typical itinerary would start in Rome, to freely roam around the countryside between Orvieto and Florence, and it would end in Switzerland.

Or the other way round.

I'd put all the cities in are interested in on a map. Note that:

• the high speed trains run from Rome to Milan/Venice via Florence and Bologna.
• the 2 "not so fast" direct EC trains from Milano Centrale to Luzern stop at Como, so the lake is on the way.

Thank you, all! I have reserved a bunch of guide books at the library and will dig in and start to do research to at least narrow down the cities to hit on our trip. I think we will cut out France and either do Italy/Switzerland or maybe just focus on Italy on this trip. Unfortunately we can't go until June 25 at the earliest, so I realize it will be hot and crowded in Italy, which is why I am leaning more toward Northern Italy and Switzerland instead of including Southern Italy in this trip.

I don't think a cruise will be our cup of tea, and we do all have our passports. If there are any suggestions of moderately priced family-friendly land tours, we might be open to that. I have never been on a packaged tour, but since our son is an only child, the thought of traveling with other kids and families is appealing.

I was thinking of cutting out Rome and starting further north, but it seems like that is the one city that has nonstop flights, so I may need to reconsider.

I am thinking that Rome, Florence, Tuscany, Pisa, Cinque Terre, Venice, Milan, Lake Como and then Switzerland might be too ambitious even if we do 3 weeks. Agree that staying 2-3 nights in each spot is ideal, we don't want to be on the go the whole time without a car, because that means taking our luggage from place to place. Thank you all for the tips for a newbie!

Hi Wanderwonder,

I’m sharing my trip report since it specifically covers northern Italy and Switzerland with kids. We visited many playgrounds and we were absolutely blown away by how many amazing ones we found, especially in the Swiss alps. I’m happy to answer any questions you might have.

https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/trip-reports/italy-and-switzerland-trip-recap

General advice is to rent a car for Tuscany to get to some of the hill towns that are not well served by trains. Watch for the dreaded ZTL when you have a car.

From Varenna on Lake Como, you can get the train to Tirano and see the Alps from the Bernina rail line to Pontresina, a charming Swiss town. Maybe you want to fly home from Zurich to avoid back tracking. The 10 yo will have to tote a bit of luggage as well, like a small back-pack.