Recommendations for Switzerland shopping/sightseeing

[NukeMeSlowly]

I am in Switzerland for 1 week (really 5 3/4 days if you discount travel time) at the beginning of March. My first visit and I am quite excited.

My base of operations will be Aeschi (the location of my wife's conference) for the first half (when I will be on my own) and then Zurich (with my wife) for the last. I was planning on travelling to Bern or Lucerne and definitely to Geneva on my solo days. Will check out Zurich for a day with my wife and then somewhere else for our last day.

I am looking for general recommendations for shopping (this trip is already expensive and I haven''t even left yet so price is a factor), sightseeing, and all around tourism. I am looking for a fairly urban experience as I am not a hiker or naturalist - although I am fine with seeing the natural sights via a train car if that is highly recommended.

I figure on at least 8 train rides, so am I thinking of buying a rail pass.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

 

[globetrotter]

Originally Posted by NukeMeSlowly

I am in Switzerland for 1 week (really 5 3/4 days if you discount travel time) at the beginning of March. My first visit and I am quite excited.

My base of operations will be Aeschi (the location of my wife's conference) for the first half (when I will be on my own) and then Zurich (with my wife) for the last. I was planning on travelling to Bern or Lucerne and definitely to Geneva on my solo days. Will check out Zurich for a day with my wife and then somewhere else for our last day.

I am looking for general recommendations for shopping (this trip is already expensive and I haven''t even left yet so price is a factor), sightseeing, and all around tourism. I am looking for a fairly urban experience as I am not a hiker or naturalist - although I am fine with seeing the natural sights via a train car if that is highly recommended.

I figure on at least 8 train rides, so am I thinking of buying a rail pass.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.


I don't know if I would acually buy anything, but this is what I like to do when I am in switzerland:

take the train to the central station in zurich. exit towards "banhof strasse" (easy enough, train station street). this is the main street of town, and leads towards the lake. just walk out, slowly, seeing the shops on either side of the street. stop for coffee when you hit "sprulgli", and have a cookie or pastry. keep walking. when you get to the lake, enjoy the view for a few minutes. on your way back, you will see the old city on your right, across the little river. cross and then meander around the old city for an hour or two.


you will see some nice watches, soem great cigars, and some reasonobly nice shoes along the way, but nothing is priced cheaply. but everything is fun to look at. a lot of very well dressed people.

in Geneva, I 'd have one dinner of fondue and racklette. ask your hotel concierge for a recomendation, the last time I was there I went to some little village that was about an hour away, but I don't remember the details now.

have fun

 

[NukeMeSlowly]

Originally Posted by globetrotter

I don't know if I would acually buy anything, but this is what I like to do when I am in switzerland:

take the train to the central station in zurich. exit towards "banhof strasse" (easy enough, train station street). this is the main street of town, and leads towards the lake. just walk out, slowly, seeing the shops on either side of the street. stop for coffee when you hit "sprulgli", and have a cookie or pastry. keep walking. when you get to the lake, enjoy the view for a few minutes. on your way back, you will see the old city on your right, across the little river. cross and then meander around the old city for an hour or two.


you will see some nice watches, soem great cigars, and some reasonobly nice shoes along the way, but nothing is priced cheaply. but everything is fun to look at. a lot of very well dressed people.

in Geneva, I 'd have one dinner of fondue and racklette. ask your hotel concierge for a recomendation, the last time I was there I went to some little village that was about an hour away, but I don't remember the details now.

have fun

Thanks for the suggestions. Anyone else?

 

[dkzzzz]

Get yourself a lot of coins for those idiotic ticket machines. Last time I was there you could not buy public transport tickets using your credit card or paper bills.

 

[Neofinitia]

Eat at the HILTL off of the Bahnhofstrasse. Epic vegetarian food since 1898. http://www.hiltl.ch/

 

[mikemas22]

Definitely go to Lucerne, it's a fine place.

 

[speedster.8]

Lucerne is spectacular, high mountains surrounding the lake. Much more dramatic than the norhtern Italian lakes.
As for sight seeing, I seem to remember ther was a cable car or something going up to one of the tops (was driven, but did notice the other options) The consert hall is amasing, the main railway station is by an other famous architects (same as one in Zurich. Afairc he also did the Lyon tgv station.

But March is stil nice for skiing!!! Varbier and StMoriz are both excelent resorts, but with slightly different clientel.

 

[NukeMeSlowly]

Originally Posted by dkzzzz

Get yourself a lot of coins for those idiotic ticket machines. Last time I was there you could not buy public transport tickets using your credit card or paper bills.

This seems like another good reason to get the rail pass. It is supposed to cover all public transport.

 

[clausc]

I live in Switzerland and there are many interesting places to visit. Currently it's cold and there's lot of snow everywhere, so maybe you can go for a day of skiing or just take a train up the mountains and eat some fondue (Interlaken Jungfraujoch, Zermatt, St Moritz, Davos, etc). Luzern it's a very nice city indeed, Zurich is cool (trendy bars and restaurants), Geneva international, Lausanne cosy etc. If you want to change for something sunnier go to the south / Italian part (Locarno, Lugano). Switzerland it's not quite for budget shopping, but you might try Milan or Paris which are at 3-4 hours away by train, so you can make a day trip.

Some shopping ideas
In Geneva: for shoes brogue.ch (CJ, Grenson, Shipton, EG, Santoni etc), the owner is from UK. Also as in Zurich, all the main brands you can find in a big city, plus small nice boutiques.
Big factory outlet near Italian border at Mendrisio: http://www.foxtown.ch/info.php?lingu...ntro=mendrisio

On the Swiss tourist office website you can also find plenty of ideas
http://www.myswitzerland.com/en.cfm/home

 

[Siggy]

I pretty much agree with what has been posted so far. Switzerland is CRAZY expensive, so there is no point shopping for anything that you can get in the states, that includes Swiss watches IMO. It is a bit too cold to really enjoy the lakes in Geneva and Zurich, so I would probably do as globtrotter suggested and in Zurich take a walk down the Bahnhofstrasse to the lake (about 20 to 30 mins slow paced) and then cut over to the hilly part of town with lots of winding little streets. This part of town is happening at night, good bar scene. Geneva is drab in the winter (but great in summer) and no nightlife unless you know exactly where to go, so that the best advice is a real fondue dinner in a cosy restaurant.

 

[NukeMeSlowly]

Originally Posted by Siggy

I pretty much agree with what has been posted so far. Switzerland is CRAZY expensive, so there is no point shopping for anything that you can get in the states, that includes Swiss watches IMO. It is a bit too cold to really enjoy the lakes in Geneva and Zurich, so I would probably do as globtrotter suggested and in Zurich take a walk down the Bahnhofstrasse to the lake (about 20 to 30 mins slow paced) and then cut over to the hilly part of town with lots of winding little streets. This part of town is happening at night, good bar scene. Geneva is drab in the winter (but great in summer) and no nightlife unless you know exactly where to go, so that the best advice is a real fondue dinner in a cosy restaurant.

So, is a Geneva day trip a total bust of an idea? I had planned on leaving Aeschi/Spiez on the earliest train to spend an entire day and early evening in Geneva. I am quite fine with window shopping and I really don't NEED to buy anything anyway. I really just wanted to see the city and its sights.

I could use some good restaurant and/or bar/nightclub recommendations - particularly for Zurich, Bern, Lucern, and Geneva.

 

[Siggy]

If you were going in spring/summer I'd say Geneva is worth it, but not in winter. I would go to Luzern or some smaller Swiss alpine towns instead. I'm not sure where Aeschi is, sounds like in the Italian cantons. Maybe you could do a day trip to Milan.

No particular restaurant / bar tips, other to say that Zurich is much more of a nightlife town than Geneva or other Swiss cities in my experience.

 

[NukeMeSlowly]

Originally Posted by Siggy

If you were going in spring/summer I'd say Geneva is worth it, but not in winter. I would go to Luzern or some smaller Swiss alpine towns instead. I'm not sure where Aeschi is, sounds like in the Italian cantons. Maybe you could do a day trip to Milan.

No particular restaurant / bar tips, other to say that Zurich is much more of a nightlife town than Geneva or other Swiss cities in my experience.

To my limited knowledge, Aeschi is a mountain village in the Berner Oberland. The nearest train station is in Spiez about 20 minutes away by bus.

Is Geneva a bad choice in winter because it is cold, everything is closed, noone is in town or what?

I don't mind the cold (although a winter in Toronto proved that that tolerance has its limits).

 

[clausc]

As suggested, Geneva is nice in the spring/summer when the weather is nice (never too hot) and you can enjoy the parks and lakeside. You can visit the center/old city in about 1 hour, there are a few museums, UN organizations, banks and luxury shops. You can find some decent restaurants, but that depends on your budget. The nighlife is not exciting at all, either underground clubs or very posh.

 

[Hengo]

I live in Geneva, and while I agree that it is much nicer when it is warm, I wouldn't say it's a waste of time. but of course it all depends on what you want to do. In terms of sightseeing there is always the UN and CERN (for the latter you must book far in advance, but it's supposed to be pretty cool). If you're interested in watches you could visit the Patek Philippe museum.

For shopping, there are quite a few opportunities. Someone mentioned Brogue before, which is great for shoes (they carry EG, C&J, Santoni, Shipton & Heneage and a few others). For high end clothing you have a Borrelli shop (called Piti Uomo), Basile (carries Brioni, Stefano Ricci and Artioli), Cariocca (which has Isaia, Caruso, Cucinelli and more), as well as a number of high end brand stores (Zili, Franck Namani, Loro Piana, LV, Smalto and the likes). Then you have Bongenie, which carries a number of brands, including Brioni, Zegna, Cucinelli, Etro, Loro Piana, Marinella and others.

For a small city (around 200,000 people live here), I think it's a pretty good supply of shops. But, as mentioned above, it's not cheap. On the other hand, the dollar is stronger against the franc than it was 6 months ago.

Also, there are numerous restaurants and cafes of good quality so I don't think you'd get bored on a day trip.

Have fun!