Visiting Switzerland on a budget

theGrinch

Any suggestions for free or low cost or must see sights/places to visit?

I have been told that food and drink can be expensive there. Any suggestions on how to keep costs down?

Any other advice welcomed.

Still in early planning stages but hoping to travel out between July and October.

richardw

It's really not a 'budget' place to go.

If you want lakes consider Bled and Balaton.

Doshwaster

Switzerland is a lovely country but it can be very expensive for accommodation, food and drink. I've only ever been there for work and always came back with a hefty expenses claim. It's never been on my list of holiday destinations.

I find Geneva to be fairly boring but I really like Zurich and Basel. If you are planning on travelling around then it may be worth getting a rail pass. Swiss trains are justifiably known for being just about the best in the world.

RADDERS

We went last year spent 12 days touring on the trains - Bradshaws Great Train Journey. We did Zurich, Lucerne, Wengen and Basel we had a marvellous time but it was not cheap. For us the one thing not to miss is the Jungfraujoc it was amazing. Got lots of tips from the Tripadvisor forums. We spent approximately £150 per night for bed and breakfast for 2, Wengen was nearer £200.
Hope that helps Radders

Nile

theGrinch wrote: »

Any suggestions for free or low cost or must see sights/places to visit?

I have been told that food and drink can be expensive there. Any suggestions on how to keep costs down?

Any other advice welcomed.

Still in early planning stages but hoping to travel out between July and October.

I've stayed in the Hotel Schweizerhof in Basel. It's situated next to the railway station.


http://www.schweizerhof-basel.ch/zimmer.html?L=0

I'm not a fan of Coca Cola but there is a fridge on the landing with chilled cans of coke and cartons of orange............free of charge, you can just help yourself.:cool:


The rooms are nice and newly refurbished.

Voyager2002

You could rent a self-catering apartment, perhaps through an agency called Interhome. That would enable you to slash restaurant and bar bills.

There are any number of "must see" places, but few of them are free. However, if you get a Swiss card, essentially a rail pass, then that includes admission to many (most?) museums and historical sites.

mummybearx

We visited Locarno for a few hours on a day trip from Lake Maggiore.

My husband ordered a hamburger with a side of fries, about 14 francs I think. Turned out to be just the meat, no burger bun!

Watch out for that one lol!

poe.tuesday

we have been there summer and winter and we go to a place called les diablerets, in the winter, its very expensive to rent but summer its much cheaper, we rented a lovely apartment for €400 for the week, the village has an outdoor lido and the apartment block has an indoor pool, you can drive there or go on the trains, there is a train that goes to the resort but its not a main line train
we drove there and its about 550 miles from calais and can be done in a day - we did trips to Gruyeres, wengen, lake geneva, gstaad etc - we also went up to the james bond resturant etc, that was expensive though.

because we know its expensive to eat/shop, we took most of our food with us and did it on the cheap and it can be done as long as you are willing to drive or at least hire a car

pm me if you want the details of the place we rented