Planning a 2+ week trip in summer 25 for a family of 4 from US - kids will be 17 & 15, possibly 2 more adults will join for part of the time. We would like to experience different areas in the Swiss/French/Austrian alps, and possibly into Italy. We like moderate day hikes, sailing, great scenery, walkable towns, and good food. From looking at plane prices for this coming summer to get ideas, it looks like Zurich may be a good place to fly in. We're not planning to just stay in Switzerland, but the forums are all country specific, and since we would be flying in and out of there ...
My initial idea -
3 nights Grindelwald (or other town in that vicinity, we would want to stop in Lucerne for a few hours after arriving at the airport that first day)
4 nights Annecy, France (stop at Lausanne or Montreux on the driving day, day trip to Chamonix, Grenoble?, Lyon?)
3 nights Lake Como, Italy
3 nights Innsbruck, Austria (or maybe Fussen, Germany)
1 night near airport before flight home.
There is a RS "My Way" Alps tour that covers some of these areas in 12 nights, starting in Salzburg, but we usually prefer to do our own planning. They have Dolomites in there rather than Lake Como, which may be interesting.
I am leaning towards renting a car, as I feel a little overwhelmed trying to figure out which trains I would need to get all of these places. Even if it stays parked some days and we take day trips using public transport, I feel like it might be the best option. Especially for being able to make stops along the way as we drive from place to place. We are used to traveling only staying a night or two in a location before moving on (we see a lot of the US National Parks this way), so having 3-4 nights in a place is on the laid back side for us. We would like to strike a balance between covering several areas, but also giving time to explore the locations we're based in.
I would love some comments or suggestions! We could probably expand the trip by 1-2 nights if it makes sense.