Car in Lauterbrunnen, Swiss Alps, Staying in Murren, What Pass? No Pass?

It has been awhile since I was there but I recall Murren being car free and yes, we took a cable car to get up there from Lauterbrunnen. It is a very scenic location. You will have a great trip!!

All depends on where and how often you are going. It costs 11.20 CHF to get from Lauterbrunnen to Muerren via Gruetschalp.

Thanks Sam,
Where can I find the pricing for the lifts?

Most lifts are listed at www.sbb.ch/en. Be careful because the first price you see assumes you have a Half Fare Card, so you have to double it to get the price you would pay unless you have already purchased a Half Fare Card.

Example: The price I gave you I found by putting in Lauterbrunnen as the "From" and Muerren as the "To" and a date a few days from now. Shows "from 5.60 CHF" as the price, but double that to get 11.20 CHF.

You should also consider what amount of travel you will be doing throughout the valley. You may find that purchasing a Jungfrau Pass will be an economical benefit. Not only through the valley but also covers boat rides on both lakes. As stated earlier, you could be paying $25USD per person just to get up and down from Murren. Factor in all other valley travel and you see that it adds up quickly. Current Jungfrau Pass cost is $290 for 7 days,

But the Jungfrau Pass does not cover the Schilthornbahn cable car. The 8-day Berner Oberland Pass covers it at 50% above Muerren. Cost is 370 CHF.

Here is the current price sheet:
https://cdn.jungfrau.ch/Prospekte_und_Broschueren/Jungfraubahnen_Fahrpreise_Preisliste.pdf
When I added up the cost of the various lifts, etc. we plan on taking during our 3 full days based in Wengen, purchasing the Berner Oberland Pass was a no-brainer!

Thanks for that price chart! That confirms our choice for the BO Pass for our visit as well. We will be staying in Mürren but want to head over to Grindelwald one day so the grandchildren can enjoy the activities on the First gondola, and maybe the Rodelbahn at the Pfingstegg lift.

If, as you have indicated in previous posts, you are going to rent a car in Nice, drive to lake Como, then to Lauterbrunnen, then to Bavaria, then to Paris, don't forget to buy a Swiss vignette when you get to the Swiss border. That is a toll sticker you attach to the windshield and allows you to drive on Swiss motorways. Cost is 40 CHF and it is a big fine if you don't have one driving on a motorway.

Going from Switzerland to Bavaria, you may have to cut through a short stretch of Austria around Bregenz. You also need a vignette for Motorways in Austria. You can buy a 10-day vignette for 9.90 EUR, or use only secondary roads when you drive through Austria.

Thank you Sam, we were leaning toward using trains, but I got prices for a long term lease vehicle and they are within a price range that is forcing us to consider a car.

Remember that you will need to add to the lease cost the cost of fuel (higher than in the US), road tolls (Italy), and parking in Lauterbrunnen and elsewhere.

can you get a lease in Switzerland? I would have thought it would be France. In any event even a car from Switzerland is likely to be a new car on a lease so it won't have the Vignette for Switzerland on the windscreen - that will be 40 Swiss Francs please,

Plus parking at Lauterbrunnen while you are up the hill in Mürren will run you in the summer 92 Swiss Francs (non cancelable, non changeable rates - ad hoc is more more expensive).

plus what Lola said.

Swiss fuel last month was 2.02 CHF per litre = (x 3.79 l/g = 7.66 CHF/USg = $8.38 per US gallon.

were these in your calculations for lease cheaper than train?

Do you know the various ways to save money on Swiss trains?

Commenting on this:

Going from Switzerland to Bavaria, you may have to cut through a short stretch of Austria around Bregenz. You also need a vignette for Motorways in Austria. You can buy a 10-day vignette for 9.90 EUR, or use only secondary roads when you drive through Austria.

The stretch of Austrian motorway from Hohenems to the German border does not require the sticker, so driving from Switzerland to Germany through that small corner of Austria is fine.

Lola, Nigel, et al, thank you for the additional considerations. Another person mentioned the ability to sight see that a train offers.

The plan is to begin the 5 week trip in Barcelona or Girona and conclude in Paris.

The following is why I began to consider a car:

-I was set on using trains, because we were going to stay in Barcelona (6-7 days) and fly to Nice, but now we are leaning toward staying in Girona. I discovered the train ride from Barcelona or Girona to Nice is 8-9 hours. If we stay in Girona and choose to take a plane to Nice we will have to back-track to Barcelona (1.5 hour drive) and spend the obligatory extra time at the airport. Neither of these seem like great options.

-The cost to rent a car in Barcelona and drop it in Nice is quite expensive because it will be a short term rental (not a lease) and the drop off fee will bring the total to around $1,200.

-There are no direct flights from Girona to Nice.

-If we stay in Girona it may be nice to have a car.

If we don't do a lease car, perhaps there is a car hire service that we could use from Girona to Nice,but I'm not sure. The drive appears to be 5.5 hours (3 hours less than train).

Once we get to Nice, I feel fairly confident that our trip can be completed by train.

Lots of considerations!

Isn’t a lease 30 days or more? You want to commit to that because the train from Girona to Nice takes 3 hours longer than what Google says is the driving time? Have you really considered the cost of fuel, parking, possible traffic tickets, etc? Have you driven a car in Europe before so you understand the road signs and possible pitfalls, such as “no-drive” zones, especially in Italy? And the narrow streets in some towns?

This discussion has veered away from the original question and into the never ending car vs. train debate.

The pass I have bought is the Jungfrau travel pass. It could be another option and you can compare it to the others mentioned.

https://www.jungfrau.ch/en-gb/jungfrau-travel-pass/

It was CHF 200 last year, looks like it will be 215 when I go this year. (that was for four days) There are a couple of reason I prefer this card including the fact that we only pay for the days we want. (The days do have to be consecutive, so you need to take that into consideration.) I always spend the time to add up what we will probably spend doing a "pay as you go" system. Because we always do the Schyinge Platte to First hike, it does save us some. It does not include the Schilthorn, but we have been there and don't do it every trip.

It is nice just to get on and off trains and lifts without having to first buy tickets. We also find that we take more trains and lifts because "we can".

For the record, we have always had a car when we travel there and stay in Lauterbrunnen, so we don't have the expense of getting back up to Muerren. That would make the pass even more worthwhile. We are currently planning our 6th trip to the alps. We are hikers and need to get to very remote places to get to trailheads and small villages which make it necessary to have a car. (and we love having it!)

If you are staying in Muerren, a Berner Oberland Regional Pass is the most comprehensive as it includes the gondola from Stechelberg, the buses in the valley, and the Allmendhubel funicular. Yes, it costs more, but it includes more.

We go to Lauterbrunnen every year and for many of those years I did a spreadsheet to see which was the best option. The winning combo has always bee a Half Fare Card plus a BO Reg Pass for all of the days we are there. On your case, get an 8 day pass to cover arrival, departure, and the days in between. You will need the lifts up and down, no matter which route you use, almost daily.

We have a mantra: "Just buy the pass." Once you have it, you ca do almost anything without reaching into your wallet again, including going to Bern for the day or over to the excellent Ballenberg Swiss Open-Air Museum. Scroll down on this page https://www.berneroberlandpass.ch/verkehrsmittel/ and download the map called "area of validity."

Hello, all. May I jump in with a question? Our plan for our trip is to get a Swiss Travel Pass when it goes on special April 15 and a BO Pass. I am trying to confirm I still need the BO pass. When I try to price out costs for lifts, gondolas etc, I can’t find Wengen (where we are staying) to Schilthorn. Can someone tell me where to find that?
Thanks!

Synapse--Girona to Barcelona airport is not a big deal. I live on the Barcelona to Nice route. I've taken trains to Barcelona, Girona, Nice many times. As I said in the last post: my first choice would be to fly, which I've done Nice to BCN.
Second choice: take the train to Perpignan, France to rent a car. Scenery from the autoroute is dull. Barcelona to Marseille is heavy with trucks. Fewer trucks after Marseille.
Finally, the train. Best case scenario is a high-speed to Nîmes, where you change to a local train or, if lucky, to an Intercités train to Marseille, and change again to a Marseille -Nice train. Intercités have reserved seats. Local trains, no.
Marseille to Nice you might be able to book a TGV with reserved seats. If not, on the same tracks, at the same speed is a local train. No reserved seats in a local train. I've been on some crowded local trains where we had to stand part of the way.
Flying is the most cost effective.

The last time we drove to Murren, we decided it wasn't worth the hassle of dozens and dozens of tunnels and missing the scenery. Our route was Burgundy-Murren--Riviera. The car stayed in the Lauterbrauten garage for five nights. For Switzerland, we'll take the train

Brent, You should probably start your own thread so you get answers directly and they don’t impact the OP of this thread.

Short answer, though: go to www.SBB.ch/en for all train and lift scheduling and pricing. Enter Wengen as “from” and Schilthorn as “to.”

Can someone tell me where to buy the half price card? Family of 5 coming for 2.5 days so would like to save money where I can. Thanks!