Final 2 days in Swiss

What time is your flight?

We have flight to catch back in Zurich - so how do I fill last two days before the flight?

Why not...well...Zurich? Or at least Lake Zurich if cities aren't your thing. But the Swiss National Museum is fantastic and there's plenty of cool neighborhoods. An alternative on the lake might be Rapperswil.

2pm is my flight out of Zurich, Wanderweg

Hi Traveler - I never thought about Zurich - just had this concept on my head - it’s just a big city without much character - how do you compare this city to Bern? And how’s lake Zurich vs lake Geneva??
I’ll have to do research on Rapperswill…

I would do 2 nights in Montreux and head to the airport from there. You can get there in under 3 hours so for a 2 pm flight you could leave Montreux around 8 am and still have 3 hours at the airport.

Montreux will give you a different feel than the rest of your itinerary, since it’s in the French speaking part of Switzerland. You can do a walk along the lake promenade dripping with flowers to the Chateau de Chillon with a boat ride back, or a walk along the 1000 year old vineyard terraces built by monks from Chexbres to St Saphorin and if you want to do a day trip somewhere you can.

If you want to see Bern, you can easily do that as a day trip from Luzern. I wouldn’t break up your last 2 nights into 2 locations and I wouldn’t do Zurich. It’s an international banking city and while there are decent things to do there of course, I think it would be a letdown after the rest of your itinerary.

Montreux, statue of Freddy Mercury on the water front. The old burned down casino made famous by Deep Purple. "Smoke on the Water, (and Fire in the Sky)".

So if I spend 2 nights in Montreux - do you recommend glacier 3000 day trip? Or is that underwhelming from someone just arrived from jungflau and Matterhorn..
Is it hard to get to glacier 3000 from Montreux? - thinking of day tripping gstaad on the way to glacier 3000

Skip it - for this area you focus on the lake, vineyards & historical elements, not really the mountains, since you’ll be in more impressive mountain spots previously — I recommend the things I suggested - Promenade Walk/Chateau de Chillon/Boat Ride (the English audio tour of the castle is worthwhile), the vineyard terrace walk from Chexbres to St Saphorin…we also enjoyed the boat trip to Yvoire, France.

Here is the winter bus schedule. I imagine the summer schedule will be up next month.
https://www.glacier3000.ch/assets/Bus_schedules_A3_-_Hiver_2023-24.pdf

I would just add those nights to Lucerne and Zermatt. For a 2PM flight you can actually go straight from Zermatt to the Airport...

Have you considered Schaffhausen - Rhine Falls - Stein am Rhein? They are near Zurich and something different.

I liked Hotel 2B in Schaffhausen.

I think he may be stuck with his Luzern/Zermatt days because he already booked hotels, but I agree with WengenK. Adding those days to Luzern and/or Zermatt would be a great option as well.

You've gotten some good ideas here. As for my perspective, Bern is definitely more charming and more classically "Swiss" -- from the collection of medieval fountains to the gorgeous blue of the river. But yeah, we're the oddballs who actually like Zurich. It wasn't as stuffy and characterless as I would have thought. Did you know the Dada Movement began in Zurich? We visited the bar. There's cool conceptual art installations along the river at the Museum Haus Konstruktiv. We watched a football (soccer) game at Kennedy's Irish Pub with a very fun crowd. So yeah, I just throw it out there. But many of the other choices are good ones too, including Bern, which we also loved.

"I think he may be stuck with his Luzern/Zermatt days because he already booked hotels, but I agree with
WengenK. Adding those days to Luzern and/or Zermatt would be a great option as well. "

you are absolutely right wanderweg.. Already have my hotels book for Luzern/wengen/Zermatt.. so I have 2 days remaining without a plan.
I never thought about spending two nights at Montreux.. - Is Lausanne good place to visit as well?? or is that like Zurich but much smaller.. - not too interested in Olympic museum..

Lausanne is ok. It wouldn't make the top of my list for 2 days, but if you did a boat tour you could hop off there for a short time if you want. It's not a great place to visit via train because you then have to take the metro down to the areas by the water because it's a steep city.

Hi Wanderweg,
Ok.. so I am doing some research on spending two nights at Montreux, and taking the early morning train to the airport.

It's approximately 3.5 hours with multiple tight connections.. Montreux to Zurich airport
This is making me nervous, as I hate rushing to the airport.
If I buy the ticket and miss the tight connection, can I get on the next train without penalty?? - Do they expect me to pay for my missed connection, or can I just get on the next scheduled train with my old ticket?

I know Swiss is known for its punctuality, but is there any instances of cancellations or delays I need to worry about??
Thank you..

A ticket purchased is good for any train on that route for the entire day
It looks like a 7:48 departure from Montreux has a single connection at Laussanne arriving at Zurich Airport at 10:51, which should be plenty of time for a 2 pm flight.
That route has a 9 minute connection at Lausanne. if you want a 15 minute connection, leave on the 7:39 train to Lausanne.

For what it's worth, I HATE being that far from the airport on the day of my flight. Yes, the Swiss trains run like...well...clockwork. But what happens if they don't? Closer in is better, IMHO. Bern inwards is more or less the one-hour ring to Zurich Airport. I'd focus on locations that you can do direct in about an hour or less.

If it bothers you, you can certainly do Bern or something else instead, I just wouldn’t split up into 2 spots. My suggestion if you hadn’t already booked things would have been to end in Luzern instead of start there so that you could have been close to the airport. But that ship has sailed, so Montreux, Bern or something like Appenzell if you hike are options. Or adding time to Zermatt.

I’ve very regularly made early afternoon flights out of Zurich with a 3.5 hour train ride from Murren and never once had an issue. That’s not to say it can’t happen, but you could also have a train issue 15 minutes away from the airport. If you don’t like to feel rushed, leave even earlier in the morning to allow tons of buffer. The Zurich airport has a big mall, so if you want to be there 4 hours early to feel “safe” you can shop & eat there.

Hello Wanderweg

So after looking through many scenerios, came to a compromise..
We'll arrive Montreux from Zermatt early and check in.; (or even arrive late, if Zermatt has beautiful weather that day and decided to do nice hike near the Matterhorn before leaving)
Next day, we'll stay late at Montreux and explore the city or even do day trips to Veyey or even hike near Rocher- de-Naye and leave for Bern around 5-6pm..
and do Bern exploration near evening or night time.. sleep and goto Zurich airport next day...

Honestly, in order to leave from the hotel in Montreux day of the flight, I would have to leave around 8AM the day of the flight with 3 tight transfers..
I would miss the breakfast, and would feel rushed..
This way, I would check out at Bern in the morning of the flight.. and have nice breakfast near the old town and slowly get to the airport by 11:30 w/o any problem..

What do you think??
thank you everybody with wonderful inputs and ideas..

I think that can work, but only do it if your interest is in Chateau de Chillon or the vineyard terrace walk from Chexbres to St Saphorin. Rochers de Naye is unimpressive after going to the BO & Zermatt and Vevey isn’t worth all the extra travel it would take to add on Lake Geneva between Zermatt & Bern. You may be just as happy doing just Bern for 2 nights and saving the extra travel time. Up to you how much extra moving around you want to do. But in theory your plan is fine, I’d just make sure you want to do the things in Montreux that make it unique to justify the detour.

OK.. finally booked my Montreux..
Hotel is near Rohers de Naye overlooking the Lake Geneva - so it'll be an option for us depending on the weather..

I think playing around whether to leave in AM or PM would give us more flexiblity in terms of spending more time at Montreux or Bern - that'll depend on weather and how we are feeling... vineyard walk and Lake promenade and Chateau de Chillon all sound great and will try to tackle that on day we arrive at Montreux - unless we leave Zermatt late due to amazing weather near Matterhorn, and tempting us with one last hike there..
If we arrive Montreux late on day of check in, we may stay very late on day of checkout to try the aforementioned activites..
BTW, all train stations have lockers for luggage right???

Just want to thank everybody who contributed to this thread, wengenK, dave A, Sam, history traveler and especially Wanderweg who was extremely helpful in forging this itinerary..

all train stations have lockers for luggage right

No, not every single one. Only the ones in towns. If I doubt, look up the station on the SBB website (Swiss Railways).

Since you're in Zermatt, how about taking the Glacier Express route over to Chur, and then head up to Zurich from there? Or at least there might be some other options from Chur. That way you have a whole day on a great scenic rail route, and not be backtracking. Bern is a nice small city, but not in the mountains. That might be a day trip from Wengen.

Happy to help!
In terms of timing needed to do Chateau de Chillon and the vineyard walk to Chexbres to St Saphorin….
Chateau de Chillon with the leisurely lake promenade walk, English audio tour + boat ride back to Montreux took us around 5 hours to do leisurely if I remember correctly.

Possibly you could squeeze in the vineyard walk in the afternoon on arrival day. There are a couple really nice restaurants in St. Saphorin for dinner if you’d like. It takes about 25 min to get to Chexbres. It’s a 2 km downhill paved walk from Chexbres to St Saphorin, so it doesn’t take too long, then meandering through St Saphorin which looks like a movie set we spent 45 minutes doing. So all in all you could “rush” this trip in probably 2.5 hours, but I think allowing 3+ hours and potentially doing dinner would be nicer.

A lot of the info online shows walking uphill from St Saphorin to Chexbres. We did it on a really hot day so we decided we preferred walking downhill (not steep) and I’m glad we did that because it meant we were walking toward the lake views instead of away from them. Also ending in St Saphorin is nice. To find the “trail” in Chexbres is slightly confusing in the beginning, so if you use Komoot, I’d recommend mapping it out before you go so your GPS can guide you in the beginning. It’s part of the Lavaux Vineyard walk.

I’ll say it again to really drive my point home….:) You’re going to be seeing epic mountain scenes in the BO + Zermatt, so if you start to run out of time in Montreux, I’d highly recommend prioritizing the things I’ve mentioned before doing Rochers de Naye. It’s nothing against it, it’s just going to be underwhelming for you after the alpine scenes you will have just experienced, whereas vineyard terraces/little French vibe villages like St Saphorin/boat ride/castle are going to be unique to the area and something that the other areas you visited didn’t have. I’d give those things the bulk of your time and if you still have some left over, then Rochers de Naye is fine.

As far as missing breakfast going to Zurich Airport from Montreux in the morning, the Lausanne-ZRH leg is an IC train which has a restaurant car. You can even buy seat reservations in the restaurant car for 5 CHF pp. Click on "For early birds and morning grouches" in the following web page to see the breakfast offerings.
https://www.sbb.ch/en/travel-information/services-on-train/sbb-restaurant-bistro/menu.html