Hi All,
I will be traveling with my family of 4 to Switzerland for the first time, during May 29-June 5. I'm trying to map the best routes to take from Zurich to Luzern, Gimmelwald, Bern, and back to Zurich, and getting anxious about the options the Trip Planner is suggesting. The routes include several connections including train, walking, bus and cable car. Does that sound right?
Getting nervous....
Your advice is appreciated.
Thanks.
There is a direct train from Zurich to Luzern, but to get to Gimmelwald requires multiple changes: Train Luzern > Interlaken Ost, Train Int Ost > Lauterbrunnen, bus Lauterbrunnen > Stechelberg, Cable car Stechelberg > Gimmelwald. Then to get to Bern you do that in reverse and take a direct train from Interlaken Ost to Bern. From Bern to Zurich is a direct train.
Your only complicated connection with be getting to/from Gimmelwald, but there is no help for that. It's a car free village up in the mountains and takes effort to get to such a special place. But people do it every day, it sounds scarier than it is.
Use SBB.ch/en for routes, times and prices.
The Swiss are very exact and punctual. Check their websites and although there are changes, you should not have any problems.
When I travel from my home in Wengwald to pretty much anywhere I always have two transfers: One in Wengen, and one either in Wilderswil or Interlaken Ost. Guess how many times I have missed those connections in the 10 years I now live here?
One. Single. Time.
And that was actually quite a funny one. We were on our way to a place on lake Geneva. A herd of cows had wandered on the tracks between Wilderswil in Interalaken. So we missed our train. We had Supersavertickets from Interlaken (as we have the Jungfrau Pass, which includes everything till Interlaken), but could of course just hop on the next train, and we were subsequently half an hour later than expected at our destination...
Swiss public transit is really very good.
Load and use the SBB app. It will show you all the steps, train times/numbers, platform numbers and changes needed. Rick loves Gimmelwald, but there is not much going on there. Easy to use after you understand the system.
Thank you all for the feedback. I feel better already. :)
