I will be arriving by train to Lucerne mid afternoon on a weekday. Have my hotel so will have the rest of that day and two full days there after. Will leave by train heading to Colmar, France mid afternoon on the 4th day. After 3 back operations and being a senior citizen, walking all day will be rather difficult. After reading the many topics here, it seems that I should wait until I am in Lucerne to see how the weather is before booking a gondola up the mountain. I am an amateur photographer so landscape photography is what I love. Do you have suggestions how best to manage my time there and what places I can see by train beyond Lucerne during my stay. Any help will be most appreciated and Thank You in advance
Posted by
Basel, Switzerland
8889 posts
"to see how the weather is before booking a gondola up the mountain." - you never need to "book" trains in advance in Switzerland. You just go to the station and buy tickets when you want to go somewhere. The 3 mountains you can do as a day trip from Luzern are:
- Pilatus: https://www.pilatus.ch/
- Rigi: https://www.rigi.ch/en
- Titlis: https://titlis.ch/en Titlis is the highest (3000 metres) with a small permanent glacier and snowcap even in summer
For photo opportunities, I suggest a day on the lake by boat: http://www.lakelucerne.ch/en/
These boats go all over the lake. They are transport between all the towns and villages along the lake, they are not just round trips. One option is to take a boat to the far end of the lake (Fluelen), which will give you lots of views, then take a train back to Luzern (train stops at the boat pier).
this 360° panorama should give you some idea what Luzern is like: http://tour.luzern.com/360/en/
Posted by
Houston, TX
219 posts
Great advice from Chris, as usual!
I would simply like to add that just as there's no need to book a train in advance in Switzerland, there's also no need to book a gondola in advance or the lake ship/ferry in advance.
Luzern will be easy to enjoy without walking much. You can look around the Old Town a bit, and then sit at a riverside cafe table for refreshments and enjoy the view.
Chris' suggestion for you to take the ship all the way to Flüelen is a wonderful suggestion. I did that on a sunny day when I was too tired to hike. To my surprise, the most beautiful and spectacular part was the last part of the lake between Brunnen and Flüelen, on the part of the lake called the Urnersee. The water in only that part of the lake was bright light blue (That might only be the case when it's sunny.) It was surrounded by high cliffs and green pastures down below the cliffs, and I recall at least one big waterfall. There were sailboats on the lake there, too. It takes about 3 hours, one way (It only takes 1 hour to return by train). The Rick Steves guidebook didn't recommend this trip as it takes so long, but I found the last part to be much prettier than the first part! If you pay the small fee to upgrade to 1st class on the ferry, which you can do once you're onboard, you'll get to sit under a nice shady canopy.