Swiss Itinerary Tips and Top Experiences from My 4-Week Trip to Switzerland: From Appenzell to Rhine Falls

Snow-dusted peaks, shimmering lakes, and storybook villages are the things that make Switzerland a traveler's dream. But how do you fit it all into one unforgettable adventure? 

In this episode, I’m sharing my personal Switzerland itinerary from a month-long journey filled with breathtaking train rides, charming alpine towns, and local traditions you won’t find in any guidebook.

From the iconic GoldenPass Express to regional trains, you’ll learn how to experience the best of Swiss rail travel with ease and why the Swiss Travel Pass and Berner Oberland Pass are your ultimate tickets to freedom. I’ll take you through highlights like the roaring Rhine Falls, peaceful Appenzell, and the dramatic Bernese Oberland, home to stunning mountain scenery and hidden gems.

You’ll also hear about unforgettable moments in the Jungfrau Region, from scenic hikes on Schynige Platte and Brienzer Rothorn to discovering the historic Landwasser Viaduct and vibrant cow parades that celebrate Swiss alpine life. I also share how a Swiss eSIM can keep you connected throughout your travels.

Planning your first trip to Switzerland or returning for another round of alpine magic? This episode is full of insider tips to help you enjoy scenic Swiss hiking trails, must-see Swiss museums, and authentic local experiences.

Safe travels,

Carolyn

Transcript

Welcome to the Holidays to Switzerland podcast. If you're planning a trip to Switzerland, this is the podcast for you. I'm your host, Carolyn Schönafinger, the founder of holidaystoswitzerland.com.

And in each episode, my expert guests and I share practical tips to help you plan your dream trip to Switzerland. You'll get helpful advice about traveling around Switzerland and hear about the most popular destinations, as well as some hidden gems. We'll introduce you to plenty of wonderful experiences that you can enjoy as part of your Swiss vacation. Each episode is packed with expert tips, itinerary ideas, and inspiration to help make your Swiss vacation planning easy. So let's dive in.

Grüezi, hello, and welcome to this week's episode. I've just returned from a fantastic four-week visit to Switzerland. So, in today's episode, I thought I would share with you my itinerary, some of the highlights, and some of the tips and learnings that I gathered on this trip. There was plenty to see, plenty to do, and some fantastic experiences that we enjoyed. So I hope you'll find them helpful, and perhaps you'll be able to incorporate some of these destinations or experiences in your upcoming trip to Switzerland.

We started with two nights in Lugano. We had actually spent a little bit of time in Italy beforehand, and we then traveled by train from Milano Malpensa airport to Lugano. We spent two nights in Lugano, which was just wonderful. The weather was quite warm, this was mid-September by the time we arrived in Lugano, and it was around about 25 degrees Celsius for the time that we were there.

We had one full day in Lugano, and on that day, we did an excursion to Monte San Salvatore, which incorporated a funicular ride up to the top of the mountain. There are a few things you can see and do up there. After we'd done that, we decided to walk back down. We walked down to a lakeside town called Melide, which is on Lake Lugano. That walk took around an hour and a half. Then, after having some lunch there by the lake, we caught the boat from Melide back to Lugano itself. That was a fun day out in great weather. Our hotel had a pool, so on both afternoons that we were there, we enjoyed some time in the pool. That was a fantastic way to start our time in Switzerland.

From there, we actually rented a car just for a few days, as we were traveling to Graubünden next. This is Switzerland's largest Canton. It's located in the east of the country, and it is large, so it made sense to have a car. We rented a car from Lugano and we dropped it off six days later in Chur.

While we were in Graubünden, some of the things that I wanted to do were based around the Landwasser Viaduct. You may have seen pictures of this previously. It's quite famous in advertising for especially the Glacier Express, but also the Bernina Express. They both go across this viaduct, which is part of the Albula Railway line, and it's one of the UNESCO World Heritage Sites.

I had been across the viaduct a couple of times previously by train, but what I wanted to do this time was to go underneath the viaduct and see it from below. Rhaetian Railways, which operates the railways in that area, have recently developed what they're calling Landwasser World, and there are quite a few different things that you can do around the viaduct. So, we decided to do some of those.

We stayed in a town called Savognin, which is probably unknown to most non-Swiss. It is quite a popular ski resort in winter for the Swiss, especially for families. There are a few slopes or pistes there, I believe, not that we were there at the right time of year for that, but I had found it in my research and decided it was a good place to base ourselves for our time in Graubünden.

On the first day, we drove to a little place very close to St. Moritz, which took around about an hour, and we did an excursion by funicular up to a mountain called Muottas Muragl. Again, the weather was really great this day, so we had fantastic views, and that was a fun thing to do. In the afternoon, we headed down into Celerina, another town very close to St. Moritz, for their Alpine procession, or cow parade, or Alpabzug, whichever term you want to use. This is when the cows are brought back down from the Alpine pastures to go into their barns for the cooler months.

I'd seen it advertised a few days before, so I thought, 'Right, we're definitely going to that.' I had not been to a cow parade before, and it was one of the things that I was really looking forward to. This was a fun experience. There was a bit of an itinerary so we could actually follow. We knew what time the first cows were due to come through. They came through with lots of other local villagers who were ringing bells and cracking whips and playing music and all sorts of things.

After the parade had gone through the main street, everyone followed the whole procession down to a big field on the edge of the town, where there were stalls set up and music and lots of festivities going on. So that was really great.

The next day, we got our first look at the Landwasser Viaduct. One of the things that has been introduced in this Landwasser World is the Landwasser Express Shuttle. The Swiss, being the Swiss, have actually built a new stop on the train line just at the one end of the viaduct. So what you can do now is you can travel from Filisur to this special stop, the Landwasser Viaduct Schmitten Stop, where you can actually go right across to the next town, which is Alvaneu, I think it's called from memory. I'll check and put that in the show notes.

You can travel across from Filisur to Alvaneu, and that takes around three or four minutes. But you can also get off at the middle stop, and if you get off at the middle stop, you can walk either up to a viewing point that looks over the viaduct, or you can walk down to a viewing point underneath the viaduct. We did both of those, but we also went right across from one station to the other. The three or four minute journey, we did that a couple of times so we knew what was going on. Then we hopped back on and got off at the middle stop and did both those lookouts, which were fantastic. I think standing underneath the viaduct, it really gives you the true sense of how big it is. This structure is well over 100 years old, so it's quite impressive.

From there, we went to Bergün, the next little village on from Filisur, where we had a wander around the town and also went to the Albula Railway Museum, which is really, really good, very interactive. It was great for children. Almost everything was, you know, the signs were in English as well, which was really good. And it was very interesting. Unbeknownst to us, that was actually free with our Swiss Travel Pass. So even though we had a car for that short time, we also did have a Swiss Travel Pass that started when we got to Graubünden. So that Landwasser Shuttle that I talked about was included for free, and so was the Albula Railway Museum.

The next day, we went into Chur in the morning and had a look around there. That took about a 40-minute drive from Savognin, so not too far. On the way back, we went via Caumasee, which is a really beautifully colored, like a turquoise lake in a forest just on the edge of the town of Flims, which we'd never been to before. So that was great.

The following day was another Landwasser kind of experience. We rode on an historic train from Filisur to Davos, which was really interesting. There's an open-air carriage, so you can sit out and you're in the open air, basically. And that was a lot of fun. There are also covered carriages as well, if you don't want to sit outside if the weather's not suitable. So that was a great day. Again, the trip was covered by the Swiss Travel Pass.

On our final full day, we visited the Via Mala Gorge, which is near Thusis, around about half an hour from where we were staying, and had a walk around the village of Savognin, which has got a beautiful lake bathing area and great playground for children, just a really nice mountain village. So that was a really nice experience.

Our stay in Graubünden. We then, as I said, dropped off our car in Chur and caught the train to Appenzell. We'd been to the Appenzell area a few years ago, but this time, we decided to stay in the town of Appenzell itself, and it was just a great base for exploring lots of things around the area.

We visited Kronberg, which is a mountain only about 10 minutes away, and another mountain, Ebenalp, which is famous for the Aescher Guesthouse that's built into the side of a rock that you may have seen pictures of. The weather wasn't very good that day. It was very, very cloudy. So on both those mountaintops, unfortunately, we had no views, but it was nice to experience both those mountains anyway.

The next day, we visited the village of Urnäsch, where there was another cow parade, but also an excellent museum, which has lots of exhibits about the Appenzell traditions and customs, you know, costumes and their musical instruments. It was really, really interesting, and an excellent museum. I highly recommend that.

We also then went back to Appenzell and visited the local brewery, which is very, very good, and the Biber World. It's a few minutes out of Appenzell, and the Biber are a very traditional Appenzell biscuit that's known all over Switzerland, and it's actually made just outside the town of Appenzell. So we visited that experience world as well.

Then on the final day, we had beautiful weather, so we took a cable car up to Hoher Kasten, another nearby mountain. We got superb views all around. So that was nice because the cloud cover had cleared, and then we walked down, which took about two and a quarter hours. It was quite steep in parts, but also on a paved road some of the way as well, so it wasn't overly strenuous, but our legs were definitely feeling it that night.

One of the great things about staying in Appenzell for four nights was that we were entitled to the new Appenzeller Card. If you stay in a town in the Appenzell region for three nights or more, you are entitled to this card, and it gives you free public transport within the region, but also admission and free tastings and things at those like the brewery, the Biber World, the Stein Cheese Factory, and even free cable car rides to all those three mountains that we went to: Kronberg, Ebenalp, and Hoher Kasten. So it's excellent value, and I'll put a link to that in the show notes for this episode.

From there, we moved on to the Lake Lucerne area. We didn't stay in Lucerne this time. We decided to stay on the lake at a place called Stansstad. It was a pretty good location. It was only 15 minutes, or probably a little less, around 10 to 15 minutes by train from Lucerne, and there's also a boat stop there so we could catch the boat into Lucerne as well, which we did a couple of times.

While we were there, we went to Mount Stanserhorn, free with a Swiss Travel Pass again. The weather wasn't all that good, but it was great to experience, and we did have lunch there and taste the Älplermagronen, which is like a macaroni cheese, which they're quite famous for. And it was absolutely delicious. We also visited the Swiss Museum of Transport, which we hadn't been to for probably 15 years. So that was great to get a refresher on that. And, of course, they've added new things since then, and that was very worthwhile as well.

On the way to our next destination, we stopped off in Bern, and I caught up with a friend, Hannah, who has actually been a guest on this podcast. Hannah gave us a quick walking tour of Bern. She knows it really well, so that was fantastic, and we had a lovely lunch up at the Rose Garden looking over the city.

From there, we moved on to a brand new destination for us, Lenk. I'm going to talk more about Lenk and the beautiful hotel that we stayed in in next week's episode, so you won't want to miss that one, because Lenk is now way up there on the top of our favorites list.

While we were in Lenk, our Swiss Travel Pass ended, and we had then started using a Bernese Oberland Pass, which we were able to get great value from as well. Some of the things we did in Lenk were visiting the Simmen Falls, and then we took a hike up to what's called the Seven Sources. As the name says, there are seven waterfalls or streams that all come together and feed into the Simme River. So that was quite spectacular to see.

We also went to one of the local mountains, Betelberg, did a bit of a hike there, and took the Monster Trottibikes down. The cable car trip was covered with the Bernese Oberland Pass, so that was great. The next day was a bit more of a relaxing day. We had booked massages at our hotel in Lenk, which were just unreal. There's a beautiful wellness center there, so, as we had every other day, we spent some time in the pool, in the spa, and then we had a bit of a stroll around Lenk, which is a lovely, lovely village. And as I said, I'll talk more about that next week.

From there, we moved on to Lauterbrunnen in the Jungfrau Region, where we spent seven nights.

On the train on the way to Lauterbrunnen, as we were on the line from Interlaken, I was very fortunate to meet a podcast listener, Alfred, who recognized me from the video podcast that we've done. Alfred and his partner, Wendy, and my husband and I had a great chat. So it was great to get to know them a bit and to know that the podcast has helped many people, including Alfred and Wendy, plan their trip. So it was great to meet you both. Thank you, and I'm glad we got those photos to prove that we actually got to meet.

On that topic, a shout-out as well to Pierre, who, Pierre and his wife, have been planning their trip to Switzerland for some time, and he follows the podcast and he follows me on Instagram. We exchanged a few messages via Instagram during Pierre's trip. So, it was good to hear what he was up to, as well, as he traveled around Switzerland.

Some of the things we did in Lauterbrunnen, nothing sort of really too new. We'd done most of these things before, although some not for quite a long time. We went back up to Männlichen and hiked across to Kleine Scheidegg, which we really love. We did a day trip to Bern to catch up with some relatives and then spend a bit of time wandering around Interlaken on the way back.

We went up to the Brienzer Rothorn on the steam train ride, which we haven't actually done for probably 20 years. So it was great to go up there and refresh our memories and see what's changed up there. We also, of course, did a walk from Grütschalp to Mürren, and went up to Allmendhubel on the funicular. The views from up there are just amazing. I can never get enough of those views of the three big mountains, Eiger, Mönch, and Jungfrau. Then we walked from Allmendhubel back down to Mürren, which is a very picturesque hike as well.

We also visited Schynige Platte again. We hadn't been there for maybe eight or so years, and both times we'd been previously, the weather hadn't been great. So this time we had a perfect day. And although there was cloud cover sort of halfway between the valley floor and where we were on top of the mountain, the views of the mountains for us were great. We couldn't actually see the lake from the top until we started to come back down again on the train. But again, the views from up there are just sensational, and we could have spent hours and hours up there. Unfortunately, we were a little pressed for time that day, and it does take 52 minutes each way on the train to get up there and back. So obviously, you've got to allow that additional time as well. But Schynige Platte was definitely a highlight that day.

We did also return to Lenk one day, which was a fair trek. It took us probably two and a half hours each way, which sounds a lot, but the train connections, of course, were very smooth. The reason we returned was because when we had been in Lenk the previous week, we saw their Alpine procession being advertised. As Lenk is in the Simmental Valley, and Simmental cattle are very well regarded, we knew that this was going to be a very professional, a big event for the village, and so we decided to return for it.

And it was fantastic. It was really good. There was yodeling. There was lots of different cow parades at different times throughout the day, as well as goats, and a really festive atmosphere. The main street was closed off. There were food stalls and a real gathering of all the locals. So it was fantastic.

After our stay in Lauterbrunnen, we moved on to another new destination, Winterthur. Again, I'll talk more about this and the hotel that we stayed in next week. Why Winterthur, you might ask? Well, originally, we were going to head back to Zurich, as that's where we were flying out from, and a friend said to me, 'Why don't you consider Winterthur? It's very close to Zurich, and it's not as busy.' And of course, we hadn't been there, so why not stay there and use it as a base to see some different things in the region? So we took his advice.

Now, Winterthur is only 15 minutes by direct train from Zurich airport, so it makes a great option if you're flying in later in the day, perhaps, and you don't want to go straight into Zurich. It's an option. It's also a lot cheaper than Zurich. So you can be in Zurich city within 30 minutes, but you can save quite a bit on the accommodation if you wanted to stay in Winterthur.

Whilst we were there, we visited the Rhine Falls and had a look around a little town called Diessenhofen. The Rhine Falls, of course, are just amazing, the power of the water that comes over there. They're, of course, Europe's biggest waterfalls, and the viewing spots that have been created, special viewing platforms, get you really close to the water. You can also do some boat rides which take you right up close to the falls, and another boat ride which takes you to a huge rock in the middle of the falls which has like a viewing platform on top of it. We didn't do that, but we did walk around and go to lots of the other viewing platforms. And we did the boat ride right up close to the falls, which was great.

The following day was our last full day in Switzerland, and we had decided to do a Rhine cruise from Schaffhausen to Stein am Rhein. Schaffhausen is another beautiful town which is only 30 minutes from Winterthur. So we went there early and had a bit of a wander around the town. We had been there before, but loved it, so we were happy to spend some time looking around again.

But then when we went to find out about the boat cruise, we were told that the river level was too high at Diessenhofen for the boat to get under the bridge. There's a big medieval wooden bridge across the river there, and with the water level too high, the boat couldn't get under, so the boat was only going as far as Diessenhofen and then turning around and going back. So we hopped off at Diessenhofen and then caught a train to Stein am Rhein, just a 10-minute train ride. We had our lunch there, had a wander around, looked at the beautiful town, and then caught the train back to Winterthur. So it was a great day, even though we couldn't do the whole distance of that Rhine cruise.

From there, we went back to the hotel and picked up our luggage and headed to Zurich airport, where we stayed overnight before flying out the next day. So in all that time, we mostly stayed in hotels, but there were a couple of places where we stayed in apartments. In Graubünden, where we stayed for six nights, and then the seven nights in Lauterbrunnen were also in an apartment. And I'll link to all the different accommodation we stayed at in the show notes for this episode.

So what were the highlights of the trip? Well, there were many, of course. When you're in Switzerland for four weeks, there's going to be plenty of highlights. But I think for me, the things I was most looking forward to, and that really reached my expectations, were the cow parades, especially the first one that we saw in Celerina and the last one that we saw in Lenk. They were both great, that I mentioned, but we also were lucky enough to see quite a spontaneous cow parade in Appenzell, where we were just wandering around through the town, and suddenly we heard all these bells, and here comes a farmer leading his cattle down to his farm down the road. So that was a very unexpected and spontaneous one. But the first at Celerina and the last one at Lenk were definitely the highlights.

I loved all the experiences around the Landwasser Viaduct. As I said before, just when you get underneath it and you see the size of it, it's so impressive. It might not appeal to everyone, but I really enjoyed all those different viewing points that you could watch the trains go across from different angles.

We were lucky enough to ride on the GoldenPass Express three times, actually. The train ride is covered with both the Swiss Travel Pass and the Bernese Oberland Pass, which makes it very easy to just hop on board. You don't need seat reservations for first or second class. You can book them, and if you're traveling in peak season, it may not be a bad idea if you want to guarantee a window seat, for example. But on two of the occasions, we traveled in first class without reservations. On our way back from Lenk to Lauterbrunnen, on the section between Zweisimmen and Interlaken, we traveled on the GoldenPass Express in Prestige Class. I had pre-booked the seat reservations a few months ago, and it was wonderful. There are only about 18 seats in the Prestige Class section, you sit up a bit higher. The window is sort of below your seat rather than, perhaps, at your waist level. So you get fantastic views. That was a really wonderful experience.

The views are what Switzerland is all about for me. I just love the scenery and can never tire of looking at snow-capped mountain peaks and glistening lakes. So I think that some of the views, particularly those that we had from Allmendhubel and Schynige Platte, were definitely highlights for me. The weather, all blue sky and no clouds on those days, just made the views especially amazing. So they were definitely a couple of highlights for me.

I loved a lot of the hikes that we did. Again, just being out in nature and appreciating the Swiss outdoors is always something that I love. As we were there in autumn, or fall for our North American listeners, the colors were just incredible. When we were in Graubünden, the leaves were just starting to change. But as we sort of progressed through the trip, we could see more and more trees that were changing their leaves to yellow and orange. It was just really, really lovely to have the contrast from the green pastures, the snow-capped mountains, and the colored leaves was really nice.

And Lenk was definitely a highlight. Not going to tell you too much now. I don't want to spoil next week's episode, but yes, we've definitely fallen in love with Lenk, and we'll be returning there for sure.

I have to say that I was a bit surprised that the popular touristy destinations were still quite busy in late September and early to mid-October. When I say the popular destinations, that's like the Lucerne region and particularly the Jungfrau Region. The second-class carriages on trains were still pretty full. The Interlaken to Lauterbrunnen and Interlaken to Grindelwald line is always busy, but sometimes the carriages were actually quite packed, which did surprise me a little.

We went on a couple of the scheduled mountain railways, as I mentioned, Brienzer Rothorn and Schynige Platte. These trains have scheduled departures. My suggestion here is, even if you know you want to leave, for instance, on the 10:45 train, get there 30 minutes before departure if you want to ensure that you get a window seat. They don't actually allocate any seats in advance. With the Brienzer Rothorn, you can buy a seat guarantee for eight Swiss Francs, and I highly recommend you do that. That doesn't guarantee you a particular seat on the train; it just means that you're guaranteed to travel on that particular departure. So, if you want to, you could buy the seat guarantee for the 10:45 departure, for example. With Schynige Platte, you can't do that, so it's just a matter of being there and getting on board and hoping that there's a window seat free, if that's what you want, particularly for taking photos and so forth.

One thing I did realize is that both of those services, if there are a lot of people, they can actually put on an extra train, and this is particularly safe for the descent. So on both occasions when we were traveling down the mountain, because there were so many people wanting to travel down at that same time, they do have a spare engine and carriages there so they can add on an additional service if need be.

We found that it's still useful to carry a small amount of cash. There were a couple of times when we could only use cash. One instance was when we hiked in the Lenk region up to the waterfalls. There was a little guesthouse, café/restaurant at the bottom, and then there was also one at the top. Both of those accepted cash only, except if you could pay by TWINT. TWINT is an electronic payment system, but you need to have a Swiss bank account in order to open a TWINT account, so it's not useful at all for most tourists. Therefore, cash only was accepted. That was one instance. On another occasion, we attended a free Appenzell music concert in a church in Appenzell, which was fantastic. It went for an hour, and on the way out, it was, obviously not mandatory, but nice if you could leave a cash donation.

I mentioned earlier about the cloud cover, sometimes on the mountaintops, and I just wanted to mention again that if you're planning on doing a mountain excursion and you wake up in the morning and it's cloudy, do still check the webcam of the mountain that you're planning on visiting. On numerous occasions, especially when we stayed in Lauterbrunnen, it was cloudy or foggy until 11:00 or 11:30 in the morning, but on the mountaintops, it was as clear as anything.

On the day that we went to Allmendhubel, for instance, we left Lauterbrunnen, it was overcast, gloomy, foggy, and we thought, 'This is not going to be good.' However, we'd looked at the weather forecast on the MeteoSwiss app, and it had promised full sun, so we thought, 'Well, we're going to set off anyway.' We walked from Grütschalp to Mürren and stopped midway for a drink at Winteregg. Whilst we were at Winteregg, maybe we were there for half an hour. When we got there, you could not see the mountains at all. By the time we left, you could see them. And as we walked then closer to Mürren, the cloud cover just disappeared, and the sky was clear of clouds, bright blue, and we had the best views ever. So when we got up to Allmendhubel above Mürren, we had the absolute best views you could imagine. So had we not checked the webcam and not looked at the weather forecast, we probably would have stayed down in Lauterbrunnen, thinking it was going to be terrible weather that day. So don't be put off. It can be bad in the valley and clear on the mountain. Of course, it can work the other way as well, but just check so that you're not disappointed.

Throughout our trip, we used, both of us, my husband and I, both had our Wi-Fi eSim, which was super easy to install. It came by email before we left home. We uploaded it or added it onto our phone, and we used it throughout the trip, and it was fantastic. It's a Swiss-owned company. It's the only one that guarantees 5G coverage, and honestly, everywhere we went, it was super fast and we always had internet access. So it made sending messages, uploading things to social media, checking maps, checking websites on the go, looking at the SBB app, of course, that was super easy. I highly recommend that.

As a Holidays to Switzerland podcast listener, you can get 10% off when you purchase an eSim or a pocket mobile device from Wi-Fi. Just need to use the promo code HTSWISS when you're ordering online. And of course, the link will be in the show notes for this episode.

So there were plenty of highlights, plenty of new things learned, and we visited so many amazing destinations. I'll put the full itinerary and links to the accommodation I stayed at, the different rail passes and products that I used in the show notes. Hopefully, you'll get some inspiration or some of these things that I've talked about today will help you in your Swiss trip planning.

If this episode or any previous episode has inspired you to include a destination or an experience in your trip to Switzerland, or the tips that you've heard have helped you with your trip planning, or perhaps during your vacation, I'd love to hear about it. Send me an email to podcast@holidaystoswitzerland.com and let me know how the podcast has helped or inspired you. You never know. I might even give you a shout-out, like I did to Alfred and Wendy and Pierre.

Next week, I'll be sharing my thoughts on the three new destinations I stayed in on this trip, and why I think they are definitely worth considering including in your itinerary. I hope you'll join me then, but until then, Tschüss.