Looking for help with itinerary

I passed by your question several times before deciding to respond. Yes, you are trying to do too much and as a result, will experience little. It is hard to cobble together a sensible itinerary given transfer times as there are some long train trips involved.

In general, when you spend only two nights in a place you have only one full day and that is rushed. In the mountains, it is more of a problem because if you only devote one day to a place like Zermatt, you will be very disappointed if weather conspires to keep you from seeing the iconic Matterhorn.

I would cut outliers which seem to be Appenzell and Lugano. Maybe go to the Berner Oberland first (2 hours from Zurich to Lauterbrunnen so doable; more time to get to Muerren), then Pontresina (3.5 hours), then Zermatt (8.5 hours Glacier Express) and one final night in Zurich (4.5 hours) where you can probably squeeze in Rhine Falls.

Spend 4 nights in Lauterbrunnen, 4 Pontresina, 3 in Zermall and 1 final night in Zurich. With this itinerary you might actually have enough time to hike.

Play around with www.Rome2Rio.com and also www.sbb.ch/en for transfer times.

Thank you very much Laurel!

I agree it is too much but I would not skip the Train ride over the Bernina Pass. You can do it as an easy out-and-back from Pontresina ( or a village nearby, see below), 2 hours each way to Tirano, or less to Poschiavo. Use the regional train and get off to walk around and have lunch at the turnaround point, then ride back.

Something like this:

From Zurich airport, head straight to Pontresina, or nearby Samedan which offers less expensive lodging and may save one train change. Either way your journey will be around 3 hours and will in life the scenic Landwasser viaduct. We did this exact journey (to Samedan) upon arrival in Zurich from the US, and it was a pleasant journey even after the long flight.

Spend three nights there, using one for the Bernina Pass train ride and one for hiking.

Then head to St. Moritz ( very close to Samedan or Pontresina) to pick up the Glacier Express to Zermatt. No need to backtrack to Chur to start this journey as you will already have covered that part.

Spend three nights in Zermatt, then head to the Berner Oberland ( Mürren is our recommendation) and continue with the itinerary you proposed.

Luzern is a nice place to spend the night before your flight from Zurich.

Thank you Lola
Is it possible to do the Bernina Express and return to Pontresina the same day?

If you mean the whole Bernina Express scenic ride to Lugano, then no, you could not do that as a roundtrip from Pontresina in one dY. Nor would I recommend it.

The so-called Bernina Express scenic journey has two components, a train ride originating in Chur and ending in Tirano at the Italy border, and a bus ride from there to Lugano. The scenic portion is the train ride over the Alps via the Bernina Pass. The bus ride is included to get you back into Switzerland, but Can be skipped ( unless you really want to get to Lugano).

The Bernina Express is in my view the most scenic of the designated "scenic" named train rides in Switzerland. It is the only Cross-alp route that crosses over the mountains rather than tunneling under them. But regular regional,trains follow the same route, using the same tracks, and see the same scenery. They run much more frequently than the named Bernina Express trains.

If you wish, you could do an out-and -back from Pontresina using the designated Bernina Express with its panoramic cars in one direction, to Tirano (it does not make all the intermediate stops like the regional,train does). Then ride a regional,train back to Pontresina.

Reservations are required for the panoramic cars on the Express. But not for the regional trains, nor are they even possible.

Here is the website for the Bernina Express if you want to checkmthe schedule and prices.

https://www.rhb.ch/en/panoramic-trains/bernina-express

To elaborate on the reply above by Lola,

While the designated Bernina Express with its panoramic cars does not call at all the intermediate stops like the regional train does, it does stop at all or most of them and is therefore no faster. The reason it has to stop is that the entire route is single track, and trains from the opposite ends can only pass at passing places which are at the stations along the way. One train will arrive at the station and wait for the other to arrive. When they are side-by-side the can then continue. If one is late the other just waits for it. Because the named train is so long it has to wait until the other train is stopped in the station before it can go by - it doesn't fit in many of the stations it doesn't call at. There is considerable rail traffic on the route which is not the named train.

Thank you Nigel and Lola - great information!

Since I don't believe there's a way to follow threads and I'd like to basically bookmark this for future reference I'm going to just respond here.