Germany, Austria and Switzerland Discovery Tour Package

No. This is a land package. International and domestic flights are quoted separately so you can use your own airline, your miles or a cheaper routing if you have one. The figure on this page covers the seven nights with breakfast, Mt Pilatus, the Salzburg Card, the Munich Residenz, every rail ticket on the itinerary including the reserved railjet seats, the city tourist tax and GST - everything from arriving at Munich Airport to leaving from Zurich. You want a flight into Munich and out of Zurich, which is usually cheaper than a return to one city and always faster than backtracking.

It is, because of how the route is built, and it would not be if it were built the usual way. Munich, Salzburg and Lucerne sit nearly in a line, so nothing doubles back. There are only two moves in the whole trip and both are trains you sit on rather than drives you endure. Zurich then comes free on the last day because a Swiss ticket lets you break the journey. What you are not getting is Berlin, Vienna or Italy - those need the fourteen-day coach tour. What you are getting is three countries properly rather than six superficially.

Every leg here is a scheduled train with a pre-issued ticket, and the two long ones have reserved seats. That is easier than a coach, not harder - European stations are signposted in English, the platforms are level, and you are never waiting for forty other people. It is also why the pace works: you decide when to go up Pilatus based on the forecast, not the schedule. The only thing a coach tour gives you that this does not is a guide talking on the bus, and a city card plus a good hotel location replaces that at a fraction of the cost.

About five hours to Zurich and another fifty minutes to Lucerne, so six hours door to door. We have put it on Day 5 and left that evening clear on purpose. It is also the best window of the trip - the Tirol valleys after Innsbruck, the climb to the 1884 Arlberg Tunnel which is the highest point on the line, then the Walensee on the Swiss side with cliffs straight out of the water. People who expected to endure it tend to list it as a highlight afterwards. Only two direct trains a day run the whole way, so your departure time comes from the timetable and is named in your quotation.

Because we priced it and it loses money here. A pass or a Half Fare Card earns its keep when you have many Swiss days and several expensive mountain tickets. This itinerary has three Swiss days and one ticketed mountain, so the card's own cost is more than the half it would save, and a pass costs several times that. You travel on point-to-point tickets instead, all pre-issued, and the difference stays in your price rather than in our margin. If you extend the Swiss leg or add a second summit, ask us to re-run it - the answer flips with the itinerary.

You go up and see cloud, and no lift operator in Switzerland refunds that. We would rather tell you now than at the quay. What we do build in is flexibility: Day 6 and Day 7 in Lucerne swap freely, so if the forecast is clearly better on the second day we move the mountain to it. Go up early either way - Pilatus makes its own cloud by mid-afternoon more often than not. There is only one summit day in this itinerary, which keeps the price where it is but does mean this one is weather-dependent.

Yes, as an add-on, with a third night in Munich attached. It is a long day trip from Munich - train, then a bus, then a walk or shuttle up to the castle - and squeezing it into the existing two nights would cost you the Munich day entirely. Castle tickets are timed and genuinely sell out weeks ahead in summer, so you have to decide at booking rather than on the trip. Tell us at enquiry, and we quote the extra night and the tickets together as one revised total.

Yes in all three cities, with Munich the easiest. Munich has a long-established Indian restaurant scene and plenty of vegetarian options beyond it; Lucerne has Indian restaurants near the station and the old town; Salzburg is the smallest and has fewer, though its old town has several. Breakfast at all three hotels will always have bread, cheese, eggs, fruit and cereal. If you are strictly Jain or need no onion and garlic, tell us at enquiry so we can note the hotels and send you a shortlist rather than leaving you to find out on Day 4.

This trip combines city walking with seated travel between cities, which is a good mix for older travellers. The hardest days are Munich on Day 2 and Salzburg on Day 4, both around five to seven kilometres of flat city walking spread across the day with plenty of places to sit. The fortress funicular and the Pilatus cogwheel do the climbing for you. The Musegg Wall towers on Day 7 have steep wooden stairs and are entirely optional. Nothing on this itinerary requires a hike. Tell us at enquiry if anyone has mobility limits and we will adjust the Salzburg day and add transfers where they help.

Layers, and one warm jacket even in summer - Pilatus at 2,128m is often fifteen degrees colder than Lucerne. Comfortable walking shoes matter more than anything else on this trip. A light waterproof, because all three countries get sudden showers. One travel adapter works across all three: Germany, Austria and Switzerland all use round two-pin plugs, though Swiss sockets are a slightly different shape, and a cheap universal adapter saves trouble. Pack light enough to carry your own bag up station stairs - there are two train moves, and not every platform has a lift.

Late May to June and September to early October. Those windows give you good weather in all three countries at once, which is the real constraint on a multi-country trip, plus the Pilatus cogwheel running and hotel rates below the summer peak. July and August have the longest days and the most reliable mountain weather but the highest rates everywhere on this route, and Munich and Salzburg are both at their busiest. Winter is the cheapest by a clear margin, but the days are short, the Lucerne wall towers are shut and the Alpnachstad cogwheel does not run, so the Pilatus day reverses.

Both. Germany and Austria use the euro, and Switzerland uses the Swiss franc, and they are not interchangeable - Swiss shops will usually take euros, but at a rate that costs you, and German and Austrian shops will not take francs at all. Cards work everywhere on this route including on trains and at mountain stations, so the simplest approach is a card for most things plus a small amount of each currency in cash. Change money before you leave India rather than at airport counters, and avoid changing euros into francs in Switzerland.

No - the properties shown are examples of the 3-star category and the central areas we book in, not a held booking. Your actual hotel is named in your quotation before you pay anything. Three dates matter here: Oktoberfest and the big Munich trade fairs, when Munich rates can double; the Salzburg Festival in late July and August, when that city is scarce and dear; and July and August in Lucerne, which sells out earliest of the three. If the property we want is unavailable, we move you to a similar-tier alternative in the same area and tell you before you pay, not after.

This is the only one that covers three countries, and the only one built around a scenic rail leg between two of them rather than around a single country's mountains. Our Paris and Switzerland package is a two-country trip for couples with a city at one end. Our Switzerland-only packages give you far more Swiss mountain time - several summits rather than one - and suit you better if the Alps are the whole point. This one is for a first Europe trip where you want range: a Bavarian city, an Austrian fortress town and the Swiss Alps, each with a real base rather than a photo stop. If you are choosing between them, the question is whether you want one country in depth or three countries properly.