We are taking a big summer trip (late July/August) to see family in Switzerland and are debating whether to spend it all there or take the train to Paris or Milano for two nights. My husband is a native Swiss-German speaker, I can suss out a little French and neither of us speak any Italian. Our children will be 6, 8, and 14. Our original basic itinerary was this:
Day one: arrive early AM in Zurich, sleep in Winterthur (family is there). Then 5 nights near Ilantz for family reunion. We want to take the Glacier Express so thought we would go from Chur, get off for two nights in Rierderalp, then get back on Glacier Express and head to Spiez/Thun area for two nights. Then 3 nights in Bern with day trips to Friborg (family there) and maybe Lucerne. Back to Winterthur to stay with family for three nights then off we go.
We are finding difficulty finding a suitable place to stay near Thun, as hotels require us to have two rooms, which means renting an apartment or house is more logical. Not many airbnb places around there. So we figured we would spend 5 nights in Bern and make day trip to Thun. It looks like it's rather inexpensive and about four hours to take the train to either Milano or Paris, and we are now thinking about doing just three nights in Bern and using those remaining two nights for a jaunt to another country. Thoughts? Is it worth it to go just two nights to somewhere else? We keep things pretty mellow for our kids and once we add time for eating and resting we think there will be time for one major thing each day. Thanks for your input!