Itinerary advice for 12 days summer 2019

The more I think about it, I’m leaning towards maybe not visiting Upper Engadine this trip and maybe adding those days around Berner Oberland and the areas around Zermatt? I think that may give us more time in each area to really experience them, than trying to add in one more destination? Thanks again 😊

Taking it one day at a time:

It is an easy 1-hour train ride to Varenna from Milano Centrale: I suggest you go directly there for your first night instead of staying in Milan. The hotels should be less expensive, and it is much more scenic. This will move your whole schedule up a day and give you one more to spend in Zermatt or the Berner Oberland.

Varenna to the upper Engadine is 4 hours by Bernina Express or 3.5 by regional train. Thus, for the BE you would depart Varenna at 8:24 am to catch the BE at Tirano, arriving Pontresina at 12:25. Or you could depart Varenna for Tirano at 9:24 am and pick up the regional train which arrives in Pontresina at 12:55. They use the same tracks and pass the same scenery.

We chose the next village, Samedan, as our base in the Engadine. Hotel Garni Laagers consists of 4 rooms above a very nice bakery, and one of them is a one-bedroom apartment which will sleep 4 comfortably.

https://www.laagers.ch

There is an excellent “balcony” (traverse) MTB trail above Samedan; you could bike up or possibly access it by lift. We were hiking but saw numerous mountain bikers having a great time. Not a technical path, and wonderful views. I believe you could take the trail to St. Moritz and then ride back to Samedan on the road (or put the bikes on the train for the 3-5 minute ride).

There is also nice mountain biking at Zermatt. We saw numerous groups on the trail through Riffelalp even though it was snowing that day (in early July).

In the Berner Oberland I highly recommend you stay in Muerren. Your boys will love the Via Ferrata there (my husband did it when we were there last August). And since you will likely have Swiss Passes, you can ride up the Schilthorn for free.

The mountain biking around there is mostly either steeply up or steeply down. I think hiking is the better choice in the BO and there are many good ones. Personally I would not spend either the time or the money for the Jungfrau train.

We stayed in an apartment in Muerren which I can highly recommend. It is a 3-bedroom, 2 bath with nice kitchen, huge balcony, and wonderful views across to the Jungfrau massif. Two bedrooms have one queen bed each, and the third a set of bunks. I will go find the link for rental.

If you do not have your dates set yet, you could catch the Dorffest (village festival) in Muerren if you can be there over the first weekend in August. The parade was on Sunday this year and that will probably be the same next year. Rick shows part of it in one of his videos but seeing it in person is much better!

I just saw your follow-up post. Do not skip the Engadine! Since you are already at Varenna it is the logical route, and if you follow my suggestion to go straight to Varenna on your arrival day, you will gain an extra day for Switzerland.

Two nights in the Engadine will give you a full day for the mountain biking and maybe a short hike from one of the lifts. A free transport pass comes with a two-night stay and you can make good use of it. And then you are in the right spot to catch the Glacier Express to Zermatt.

Where are you flying from to get to London? Milan?

Here is the Muerren apartment:

https://www.tripadvisor.com/VacationRentalReview-g188084-d6588573-Chalet_Oberdorf_Murren-Murren_Jungfrau_Region_Bernese_Oberland_Canton_of_Bern.html

Thanks so much for your replies. My only worry about trying to make it Varenna on our travel day is that we’ll be leaving the US Friday night with a layover in Madrid then arriving in Milan mid afternoon. My thoughts were that we’d all be toast by then, but didn’t realize the train ride to Varenna would only be an hour. Is the train station in Milan close to the airport? If we cut a day in Varenna by doing that, we’d only have the one full day on Sunday if we left for upper Engadine on Monday instead of Tuesday. Is that enough time to enjoy the lake area? Or since we gain a half day in upper Engadine by taking an early train, should we leave Varenna as is and leave upper Engadine a day earlier? Should I add that saved day to zermatt or Berner Oberland? I was looking at Mürren or wengen to stay, so that’s good to know about Mürren.
If we didn’t head to upper Engadine it would give us 3 full days in zermatt, 4 in Berner Oberland, but it sounds like skipping upper Engadine isn’t a good idea?

We haven’t booked tickets to London but was thinking Bern or Zürich, hopefully bern since it seems closer?

From the Berner Oberland to London their best airport option is Zurich.

If it were me I would stay in Milan and recoup from your flights. Your itinerary seems to have you traveling a lot sitting on trains. Although those rides are fantastic, I'm not sure they can entertain a 13 and 14 year old for too long unless they really enjoy scenery. I would skip Lake Como unless you have something pre-planned. I would go from Milan to The Berner Oberland (5 days) this a great place for outdoor activities and your 13 and 14 year old children will enjoy it. I prefer Wengen because it is close to some great hiking trails starting in Mannlichen. You can explore Murren and Grindlewald form there as well. I would then head to Lucerne (3 days) and take a cruise on Lake Lucerne to a cogwheel train trip to Mt. Pilatus and also enjoy the sights of Lucerne. I would then head towards Zurich with day trips to Rheinfalls and Ebenalp. Then fly to London from Zurich. Just some ideas. Enjoy your trip.

Threadwear, with all due respect, you are totally changing their trip, taking away Lake Como and adding Luzern, Ebenalp, and other places they did not mention.

We just returned from our sixth Switzerland trip, most of them for 2+ weeks and all for hiking and active adventures. All but one with teens, 20-somethings, or younger kids (last trip with grown children who went with us in 2002 and 2005, and now have children of their own).

Their proposed trip looks fine to me. The only long train ride they have is the Glacier Express to Zermatt. Our experience is the teens love the trains and enjoy some private time while riding. They want an active adventure and Luzern with a boat trip and Pilatus does not offer that. As for staying in Wengen, yes it gives access to Maennlichen and the easy walk to Kleine Scheidegg, but I think that might be rather boring for teens. From Muerren there are better views, more hikes, and the Via Ferrata which they should love, as well as the free Schilthorn (assuming they get Swiss Passes).

As for the first day, yes it appears they have a long trip to get to Milan. But they have to take the train from the airport to Milano Centrale in any case, and from there it is only an hour to Varenna. Not that difficult even if jet-lagged (take a nap on the train, just don’t miss the stop at Varenna). And they would end up at a much nicer place than an expensive city hotel in Milan. Not that I do not like Milan; we are planning on spending several days there next trip. But their goal is Lake Como and Switzerland, and it is not difficult to head straight to Como instead of stopping their travel in Milan in mid-afternoon. They would arrive in Varenna with ample time for a refreshing stroll along the lake, and time to shower and freshen up before enjoying dinner with a view of the lake. And then to bed.

This would conform to the recommended "stay up until local bedtime and use the daylight to help adjust your body clock" for arrival day.

Having taken young teens to the Berner Oberland several times, I'll make the case for spending more time in the Murren/Lauterbrunnen area (I consider either town to be a great base).

We found 10 days there to be the ideal, with the assumption that about 1/3 of those days will be affected by rain, overcast, or mist.

To get an idea of what can be done in the area, click on my name and in my profile you'll see a link to our dozen favorite hikes in the area, with maps and pics. There's cows, waterfalls, summer luges, and fantastic views. I'd encourage your teens to look at it and help in the planning. My teens are now grown and keep returning to the area.

In short, I don't think you'll ever regret adding more days to the Berner Oberland region.

Lola, you may have misunderstood my post. My reason for offering alternatives was to substitute and shorten travel times since OP only has really 10 days to enjoy their time in Europe before heading to London. First, OP stated they were flying into Madrid with a layover and then flying to Milan. I understand it is a only a hour train ride to Varenna from Milano Centrale, but by the time they arrive in Milan airport, get situated, get to Milano Cenrale that will be at least another hour or more. I was assuming they would be exhausted. The train ride to Engadine will take a half a day from Varenna and the trip to Zermatt from Engadine will be 6-8 hours and the trip to BO from Zermatt will be another half day. While all these places are great to see, my suggestion was to go straight to the Berner Oberland from Milan for a longer active stay and use the time to explore the BO instead of long train rides. However, if train rides are their thing that's great. As for Murren versus Wengen, its a personal preference I just prefer Wengen. Both are accessible by train to each other. Second, I suggested Luzern because it has a beautiful lake to substitute for Lake Como. Plus I suggested Mt. Pilatus because I thought it might be an interesting trip to take the steep cogwheel train to the top and enjoy because OP stated they enjoyed the outdoors. Luzern is a very nice and interesting city to enjoy. Ebenalp is a fantastic place and a very nice hiking experience and only a 2 hour trip from the Zurich area. Rheinfalls is a very enjoyable place to see and only about an hour train ride. My suggestions are always to offer more time enjoying than transporting. In the end OP will make the final decision based on what is good for them. I always appreciate alternative input when I plan a trip and my first itinerary never looks like the final in the end. There is no right or wrong way. OP.....enjoy no matter what you decide.

Threadwear, I apologize if I sounded harsh. But my concern is that your alternative plan does not take into account their stated interests at all, especially mountain biking and rock climbing. Muerren is a much better base than Wengen for climbing (the Via Ferrata) and hiking. And the Schilthorn is a better high mountain trip than the Jungfrau for them, because (a) it is free with a Swiss Pass, while the very pricy Jungfrau only offers a 25% discount, and (b) the Jungfrau is a ride through a tunnel on a very crowded train, while the Schilthorn is a thrill ride on a cablecar high above the ground (and may also be crowded but at least you are not in a dark tunnel for 30 minutes). The kids might really enjoy the James Bond movie stuff up there as well.

Neither Wengen nor Muerren has much to offer a mountain biker, unless one is an expert endurance rider (like my son who was there with us last month). Muerren does have the one downhill ride Rick probably talks about in his book, but the trails above town are mostly steep rocky single-track, much more enjoyable by hiking. Wengen doesn’t really offer anything for biking. We saw people take their bikes up on the cablecar to Maennlichen but the trail from there to Kleine Scheidegg is so crowded with hikers (and at one point cows) that they ended up pushing their bikes rather than riding. From Kleine Scheidegg is mostly road downhill back to Wengen, not all that fun or interesting.

That is why I thought the Engadine is a good fit in their plan, especially if they want to go to Varenna first. The Engadine has some nice trails that are not just straight up or straight down; I mentioned the one we hiked and that could keep them busy for half of their day there. Use the other half for a hike. And Zermatt fits well too; there is lots of varied terrain above the village that would be good for MTB. And I will have to look, but I’ll bet there is a ropes course, zip line, via Ferrata, or other climbing-type activity there.

I assume they are flying into Milan because they want to visit Lake Como, albeit briefly. The transfer to Varenna on their arrival day is no different than what we do when we go to Switzerland. They have an overnight flight to an airport in Europe (Madrid) where they change planes to a short-haul flight to Milan. A short one-hour train ride after that is not all that taxing. Our standard journey to Switzerland starts with an overnight flight from the West Coast to London, changing there to a plane heading to Zurich. We arrive around 5 pm and hop a train to Luzern (one hour away) or Kandersteg (two hours) so we can get out of the city, have a refreshing walk and light dinner, then go to sleep and wake up where we want to be. A one-night stop at a hotel in Milan when they arrive in mid-afternoon would be a time-waster, in my view.

We love to hike, mtn bike, rock climb, basically anything outdoors.

Summer or winter? What level of rock climbing?

Zermatt has a lot of options a step above hiking on trails:

• via ferrata (see https://www.zermatters.ch/summer/mammut-klettersteig)
• via ferrata+: Gorge Adventure (summer and winter; see https://www.zermatters.ch/winter/gorge-adventure)
• "easy" mountaineering on Breithorn (see https://www.zermatters.ch/summer/breithorn)
• rock climbing on Rifflehorn

Is the train station in Milan close to the airport?

Depends which airport. If you are arriving at Milan Malpensa there is a station at the airport. You take a train from there into Milano Centrale station, and another from there to wherever you want to go (Varenna).
If you land at Milan Linate you get a bus to Milano Centrale.

Tues- Varenna to upper Engadine (Bernina express 6 hrs? Is this the best route?)

It is the only rail route. This is going over the Alps, via the Bernina Pass. That is why it is so spectacular. The named "Bernina Express" is only one train on that route. There are regular hourly trains that cover the same route and you see the same mountains.

Friday- to zermatt via glacier express (best route as far as easiest and fastest?)

Again, The "Glacier Express" is only one of the trains on this route.

Lola has given you a great outline for including your ideas and activities. The Berner Oberland, Zermatt, and Upper Engadine are all marvelous and different from one another. We've made many trips to Switzerland now and we liked all of these areas more than we liked Luzern or Lugano, FYI.

Mountain biking is not our kind of activity, but my goodness the options for doing mountain biking in the Upper Engadine are amazing! We stayed in Pontresina last month and enjoyed it very much as it afforded us some nice hiking without it being too challenging. But you will find hiking as challenging as you can imagine there, as well. Pontresina is cute, accessible, has good bus and train options, an excellent Tourist Info Office, and ample restaurants. As Lola mentioned, your lodging will give a free pass for the mountain lifts if you stay at least two nights.

I think each of these areas warrants at least 3 nights. In Zermatt, if you get a day of bad weather you miss THE MOUNTAIN entirely. 3 nights gives you a better chance of good weather at least one day. But if you decide you are moving around too much and if the scenic trains are not imperative, you may enjoy picking two of the three areas and extending your time accordingly. We just had our 5th trip to the Berner Oberland and spent yet another week in our favorite base, Lauterbrunnen, and wish we had spent two weeks.

You guys can’t imagine how helpful all of this information is- thank you so much 😊

We know we can’t possibly do everything we’d like on one trip, and the top 2 on our Switzerland list are Berner oberland and zermatt. We are accustomed to giving ourselves about 10 days in US national parks, so I think to give us more time to really enjoy each area, we’re going to have to skip Upper Engadine this trip and give that area the time it derserves another time 😢

Afraid we’ll feel like we’re trying to fit to much in and won’t be able to really enjoy the areas if we’re rushed. Thanks again so much for your advice 😊

Wise decision to limit yourselves to Zermatt and the BO. You will be back!