My Way Alps September 14 to September 25

I will see you in Salzburg! :-)

Looking forward to meeting you and our group and having an incredible trip! 🏔️ 🧳

I should add that I’m happy to share information if you’d like. I’m most familiar with Switzerland, having visited multiple times since 2021, and I’ve been to Salzburg once. The other tour locations will all be new to me.

As you’re new to the forum, you might not be familiar with the tour scrapbooks—there are some great ones for the My Way Alpine tours:

https://www.ricksteves.com/tours/scrapbooks/tour-alum-scrapbooks

This is also a great resource for the Lauterbrunnen area, put together by a forum member:

https://lauterbrunnenhiking.wordpress.com/

I’m arriving in Salzburg a few days early and plan to take one of these Hallstatt tours—probably the full-day Sound of Music/Hallstatt combo:

https://www.bobstours.com/tours/

I have another trip coming up in May that I’m focused on right now, but I’ll turn my attention to the My Way tour once I’m back from that one.

Thank you for sharing, so much helpful information! This will be our first trip to Europe (besides studying abroad/travel MANY years ago) so any and all advice is very much welcomed and appreciated! We're planning on flying into Munich a few days before the start of the trip. Enjoy your upcoming trip in May! Very exciting!

Hi!
We've been on 2 MWAlpine RS tours and LOVED them so much that we're going again this September for our 3rd one (san the triplets this time). Our dates begin the 16th- However, we're arriving early in Salzburg so might see you! Do you know what your first hotel is ? We'll be at the Mirabellplatz.

We just returned from our first "traditional" RS tour in Belgium/Holland. I am VERY much looking forward to the Alps My Way, again!

Prost!
~Mitzi

Hi Mitzi! Thanks for your post! Wow, multiple My Way Alpine tours! It must be that amazing you keep coming back for more! That’s too bad our dates don’t align but maybe on some future trip they will! Our first hotel is Hotel Hofwirt.

I have been wanting my husband and I to do this tour. Please post updates as I may end up booking it next year. We are not huge hikers, but love to walk in the countryside as well as learn all the history shared by the guides. We just finished our first RS tour this past week and loved it. It was "high energy", active and we think the 'my way' may be better for us to see all these beautiful mountains.

Hi mros,
My husband and I also just finished our first traditional rs tour this past week. I'm exhausted!! and I consider myself a relatively fit, late 50 something, active woman. As you may have read above, I loved the My Way Alps! The "hiking" is usually always trails and well-worn paths out in the middle of an open area. You can pick from literally dozens of 'hikes' and will definitely find one that fits your level of comfort. I only experienced 1 out of both trips of the Alpine tour that was beyond my comfort and that was simply because I accidently left the marked trail! It was completely my fault and I still made it through unscathed except for a bad case of stinging nettle on my ankles. Again, totally my own doing and avoidable by most who read the signage correctly :)
~Mitzi

Mitzi,

How was the Belgium/Holland tour? We're signed up for next year and excited about it.

Tony

For this tour, by chance does anyone have a morning flight departure from Geneva on Friday September 25th? We are looking at the transportation options to depart the hotel at 5:30am for a 10:05am flight and they are limited but if there were several people a dedicated car may be best.

I fly out of Zurich a couple of days later, so I’m no help.

I wonder if the tour office can help: [email protected].

I’m sure the tour guide can help once there, but I’m sure you want to have transportation arranged ahead of time.

Good luck!!

P.S. Some info here might be helpful:

https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/france/chamonix-to-geneva-shuttle

https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/france/shuttle-from-chamonix-to-the-geneva-airport-in-the-middle-of-the-night

Thanks, Carrie!
I did research these options and the early hour is tough. I did get a private transfer quote of €325 for either 2 or for 4 passengers departing the hotel at 5:30am for the airport on 9/25. It would be great to share this service with fellow group members but instead we may depart Chamonix later Thursday via FlixBus and lodge near the airport for the Friday morning flight.
It seems prior to departure we also need to book Neuschwanstein Castle for 9/19, thinking maybe 10am.
Just thinking out loud here if anyone has thoughts or suggestions as they are very much appreciated!

€325 does not sound terrible for the private transfer. And you wouldn’t have the hassle and cost of yet another hotel change.

Yes, the 19th would be the day for the castle. I’m not planning to see the inside, but if I was, I would pick the earliest timeslot—9:05 with audio guide, or 9:20 if you want an English guided tour. I always find it best to get in before the crowds. Although it looks like you’re not allowed to take photos, so getting in right at the start might not be as important.

I need to get working on Salzburg. I did buy my train ticket yesterday from the Vienna airport. Next is booking my sound of music/Hallstatt tour. I’m thinking I’ll do that on the Tuesday, the 15th. I’ll be there for the weekend before too, but weekends are always more crowded.

Then I’ll move to planning Italy. I really wish we knew now if we’ll be stuck in Bolzano. I’m hoping for somewhere closer to the mountains.

Sounds like your planning wheels are in motion, too! Weekdays and mornings will be ideal for the tours and sites. We just heard back on a non-refundable and non-transferable option for early Friday morning transport to airport, €55 per person, for a total of €110 for two passengers so we'll book that and stay the last night. It's going to be hard to leave! Neuschwanstein Castle booked for 9:20am.

Alright! You had me thinking about Fussen, so I watched this you tube video last night:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zXrte2mUKJA

I’m always on the lookout for photo spots and looks like there will be plenty in Füssen.

I definitely want to check out the waterfall.

https://placesofgermany.de/en/places/lech-falls/

Oh, I forgot to mention. There is a forum member who is on this tour now. I can't wait to hear what she has to say about it.

I emailed the tour office to see if they knew which town our Dolomites hotel will be located in.

We will be staying in Castelrotto, at the Hotel Cavallino D'Oro. I'm so exicted!!! He said there's a slight possibilty this could change, but hopefully it wont.

Our Alps My Way Tour Dates are "September 16, 2026 — Sun, September 27, 2026"
but your dates are a bit different.
Is this the same tour?
We would like to get to know our fellow travelers.

Hi bobbim03801, it looks like the tour Heather, Rob, and I are on starts 2 days earlier than your tour. We might run into your group in the Lauterbrunnen Valley as we’ll be there for 3 nights.

bobbim03801,
My RS Alps tour are the same dates as yours! I've started a thread here:
https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/tours/rs-my-way-alps-16-27-sept-26-r-u-going

I've been 2 x already and this will be our 3rd - it's THAT amazing!

~Mitzi

Thanks!
Looking forward to meeting our fellow travelers.

"We will be staying in Castelrotto, at the Hotel Cavallino D'Oro"

@Carrie (and everyone, lol!)- Not on this tour but I stayed at the Cavallino D'Oro on the Best of Italy tour a few years ago. This is a very cute hotel and well-located. Tour members did have problems getting dinner on our arrival night into Castelrotto so you may need to either go to dinner real early or make reservations for your nights. Our guide misjudged and took us on a walk up to the Calvary Chapels on the hill above the village so by the time we got back down all the restaurants were full.

Thanks, Pam! I was already planning on bringing some instant oatmeal since I sometimes like to get out before the hotel starts serving breakfast. I'll toss in a couple of extra packets for dinner too, just in case. :-)

@Carrie
In light of a popular thread in the forums right now about the food on some of the RS tours being subpar at times,
.. I wanted to say... In my own experiences on the RS My Way Alps tours, I would classify the breakfast buffets as in the top 4 reasons I'm returning for the 3rd time. i.e. - I find them absolutely delicious!

Thanks, tripletblessings! I'm happy to hear that. :-) I'm pretty easy to please at breakfast. A couple of slices of toast and some fruit, and I'm good to go.

Hello, I will be on the My Way Alpine tour Sep 14-25. I just got back home from the Best of Switzerland tour two days ago. Fantastic trip. I have never been on a "My Way" tour before, only the regular RS tours. I'm really looking forward to this tour. I'm planning on arriving in Salzburg Sep 10 and staying at the Hofwirt Hotel. I booked the Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau Castles for Sep 19. I booked the 9:55am English guided tour at Hohenschwangau and the 1:40pm English tour at Neuschwanstein.
On one of my days in Salzburg, I will book the full day Sound of Music and Halstatt tour with Bobs tours. I'm still piecing together other things to see and do.... Salzburg Museum, Mozart's Birthplace, Salzburg Cathedral, Hohensalzburg Fortress, Hellbrunn Palace and Gardens are on my list. And of course, just roaming around.
I'm also getting excited! Lynn

Hi Lynn! Nice to meet you! Welcome back from your RS Switzerland trip! Sounds amazing! I’d love to hear how it compares to our upcoming My Way Trip! We will see you in Salzburg! Can’t wait!

See you there, Lynn!

A quick note about Bob’s tour. I had planned to sign up for that one too, until I saw on their website that the tours won't run unless they have a minimum of five people. I have my heart set on seeing Hallstatt and didn't want to risk the tour being canceled, so I ended up booking the Hallstatt half-day tour with Panorama, which guarantees that their tours will run. I believe they use larger buses than Bob’s, but neither tour is guided. They simply drop you off in Hallstatt, and you're free to explore on your own. Then, on a different day, I booked the 4-hour Sound of Music tour with Bob’s.

Hi Heather and Bob, nice to meet you to and looking forward to traveling with you in a few months. Yes, I'm very curious about the two different styles of tours. I understand the differences, but we'll see which ones I like better. Happy planning and I'll see you in Salzburg.

Hi Carrie, thank you for the Sound of Music/Halstatt tour info. I'll keep that in mind about the 5-person minimum on the Bob's combo tour. I arrive Sept 10, so I have a few days in Salzburg where I can do tours separately also. With as many people as I see out traveling, I would be surprised that 5 people would not sign up on a Tuesday in September. (4 counting me...lol)
Also, I saw in another post that our hotel for Day 3/4 might be Hotel Cavallino d'Oro. I checked out the website, it looks amazing. Fingers crossed for that hotel. See you in Salzburg.

Hi! I may be the forum member Carrie referred to, as I just returned home from the My Way Alpine Tour! 😀 I hope to do a trip report soon, but for now, I have a few recs to share.

We used Mountain Drop-offs for our ride from Chamonix to Geneva. It was €85 for two people, and was a “shared ride” that we had to ourselves. We were traveling to Geneva during the G7 Summit, and had to change our plans a bit to avoid protests and boarded up buildings. We decided to stay in Chamonix one more night, and give up our Geneva sightseeing plans. The company worked with us and all went well. The bus would have been cheaper, for sure, but door to door service in an air conditioned vehicle was worth it for us. That shared ride ONLY drops off at the airport, so we asked to be dropped off where arrivals pick up hotel shuttles. Then we took the free shuttle to our airport hotel. It was easy.

It was an absolutely magnificent tour, and I can see why Mitzi has repeated it and plans to go again. I’m still marveling at all we were able to see and do. We took hundreds and hundreds of photos and videos, and looking back at all the beautiful sights we experienced is such a joy.

The Mannlichen to Kleine Scheidegg hike in Switzerland was awesome, and was fairly easy for me - someone with a healing foot injury. We paid extra for the Royal Ride on top of the gondola, which was fun and worth the €10 for two of us. I had borrowed poles from our hotel - was able to do that in Castelrotto and Lauterbrunnen, but not Chamonix, fwiw.

Bob’s Special Tours Sound of Music tour was excellent, and we preferred the 16 member mini van tour to the larger crowds we saw with Panorama. I was pleasantly surprised that it included a city tour of Salzburg as well as the SoM sights.

Our Edelweiss Cooking School class was so much fun in Salzburg. We made apple strudel and then Salzburg Nockerl. We recommended it to our tour friends that afternoon, and they signed up for the next day, and made strudel and pretzels! We arrived in Salzburg early, so our cooking class was the morning of the day our tour began at 5:00 pm. Would recommend that schedule, as then we could do the Sound of Music tour early the next morning, before it got too hot.

We had an excellent dinner and then a candlelit concert in the fortress there…really memorable. https://www.salzburghighlights.at/en/ We booked that experience the day of, and got the last tickets, after seeing that the Mirabell Palace concerts were sold out for both nights of our tour there. I think either experience would be wonderful.

I’m sure I’ll have more to share later, but wanted to add in the transfer info and activities in case you want to make reservations now.

Laurie 😊

Laurie,
I'm so glad to read that you love the My Way Alpine tour as much as we do! In the mini TR you just wrote, I've already learned some things for our September trip! I wait anxiously for your full review and more tips and hints :)

Welcome home!
~Mitzi

Alright, Laurie’s back! :-) Glad you had a great trip. Looking forward to your trip report.

The walk from Mannlichen to Kleine Scheidegg is one of my favorites. It had not opened yet for the season last time I was there. So, I think I’ll make up for it and do it multiple times.

Here’s a video for those unfamiliar with the walk:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zsp2XG8lPyw

I think the cows will be gone from Mannlichen though for our Sept. dates.

Laurie, thank you for sharing these details! So happy to see what a fantastic time you had! The cooking class sounds fun and great timing! Good to know Mountain Drop Offs is so solid, too! We are counting the days until our trip!

Carrie, thanks for posting the video of the walk! Looks absolutely stunning! I have to hunker down soon and make a must do list and include that one!

Thank you, Carrie for posting the video of the Mannlichen walk. Absolutely beautiful and am planning on doing that probably on Day 8. Lots of planning to do still in not that much time really.

Laurie's apple strudel class sounds amazing, and I need to get signed up for that. Besides booking the Sound of Music tour and the Castle tours on Day 6, I haven't planned much yet. I would like to try and find a concert in Salzburg though.

Be sure to check out Laurie’s trip report from her recent trip. Super helpful!!

https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/trip-reports/my-way-alpine-tour-june-2026-our-magnificent-journey

Thanks, Carrie! Such a detailed & informative review!