Hello all! Thanks to all forum members for all the helpful advice.
Here is my question. We are planning a trip for this July. Flying into Munich (best priced airfare for us); 10 day trip. End of our trip will be @4 days/5 nights in Murren. (flexible on this). We are looking for a place to spend the first 3 nights/3 days.
About us: we are a family of three, w/one 13 year old boy. We have been to Munich, Salzburg, Fussen, Geneva, Montreux, Murren, and Zurich before. (yes, we love this area!). We almost always do trains for our transportation - love the simplicity and ease. Last time we had a travel day from Fussen to Murren - which was a very long travel day (@10 hrs), and I would prefer to avoid that again if possible.
Goals: it would be great if that first day we get into munich we don't have to travel too far. flight gets in at 10 am and I know we will be tired. We can catch another flight from munich to geneva or zurich if that helps (have miles to do this).Flight time to either of these cities is @50 minutes; train time is 4 1/2 for zurich and longer for geneva. We enjoy castles, lake activities, biking tours, alpine slides/rope courses, even thermal baths.
Thoughts:
a) go to salzburg again. train time from salzburg to zurich is 5 1/2 hours. Longer than I want, and would need to break up the trip from there to murren. But I really do like salzburg and there is a lot there I have not seen - both times previously it was SOM tour and the town, and that was it. But that doesn't get me around the long travel day. (zurich to lauterbrunnen is another 2 1/2 hours)
b) fly to geneva. make a home base somewhere around there (maybe Lausanne? we haven't seen that area) - we enjoyed seeing chillon and the chocolate train in this area, we could see that again. (Geneve to lauterbrunnen is 3 1/2 hours.)
c) fly to zurich, then take the train to lucerne (1 hour train from zurich to lucerne - otherwise if we don't fly 7 1/2 from munich to lucerne). That is still a lot of travel right after the flight, but doable. (lucerne to lauterbrunnen is 2 hrs 20 min). The plus there is we have never been to lucerne, so that would be nice.
d) another thought is lake konstanz - lindau is 2 1/2 hours from munchen, st.gallen is 3 1/2. Never been to that area, looks like there are some pretty things to see. (st gallen is 3 1/2 then to lauterbrunnen).
Thoughts? Is there an area close to munich/murren that I am missing that would hit our interest levels above? Any input is very much appreciated! Thanks.