Switzerland, is Basel worth it.

Have you been to Switzerland before? I like Basel, but wouldn’t suggest it if you haven’t been to Lucerne or the berner oberland before.

Basel is nice, but it's not in the mountains. Thats what one goes to Switzerland to see.

I have not been to Switzerland before. We will fly into Zurich from Iceland. The Switzerland idea is that we need to be in Dijon on Sept 1, and it seemed like the closest area to visit.

I guess you need to decide if you’d like to spend some time in the mountains or just the cities. Once you decide that, we can provide some more advice.

I’d suggest taking a look at lucerne. That is a quick (just over an hour) train ride from the Zurich airport. I’d skip Zurich and head straight to lucerne. Then, as stated above, do you still want to go to Basel or head to the mountains.

We are making a change. Fly into Zurich, overnight in Zurich and take the train to Lucerne for 5 days. Thank you for your suggestions.

I think you’ll really like Lucerne. The Rick Steves Switzerland book covers the area well.

I spent 7 nights there in Sept. 2021 and 3 nights in June 2022. If you’d like, you can click on my name to get the links to my trip reports for those trips. It might give you some ideas for things to do when in Lucerne.

Have a great trip!!!

What time of day does your flight arrive in Zurich? If it's in the AM, you won't likely be able to check into a hotel until later that afternoon. So you could just as easily keep moving forward and take the train from the Zurich airport, and be in Luzern in 1.25 hours. Zurich is Ok, but Luzern is better. And a half day jet lagged in Zurich isn't that much.

Flight arrives at 4 pm, plus we will have been in Iceland for a week.