Planning For Zermatt マッターホルンのふもと町を目指して

Living in Switzerland, it's almost a requirement that you at least have a glance of Matterhorn, the symbolic mountain of Helvetica. Ever since I started living here I wanted to go there but it's actually not that easy. For one thing, it's not cheap. A full-price one way ticket to Zermatt, the infamous city which is the gateway to the Mattehorn, costs about 75-95 CHF. Plus, the round trip to go up to the mountains to see the Matterhorn costs 88 CHF one way. To top it off, Zermatt is one of the most expensive ski resorts, making the accommodation among the most expensive in the most expensive hotel rate country in the world.

スイスの象徴とも言われる山、マッターホルン。そしてそのふもとの街、ツェルマット。ずっと前から行きたかったものの、思ったほど簡単に行ける旅ではない　汗　まず遠い。ジュネーブはルマン湖を半周していかないといけないので2時間半はかかる。マッターホルンが一番良く見える時間帯が朝であることから一泊しないと無理がある。その上高い。通常券だと片道1万円近くかかる。そんなわけでスイスに来てから一年経ったもまだいけないでいたの・・・・・だが！運よくモンペリエで知り合った同じ学校に通う語学学校の日本人の方二人がスイスに遊びに来てくれるというのでツェルマットがいよいよ現実になってきました。

できれば朝早くツェルマットに行きたいので初日はベルンで合流して次の日早朝マッターホルンのふもとに向かいます (*^^*) いざ出発！まずはベルン！


It was by sheer luck that everything came into place that made this trip possible. Two of my friends whom I met when I was going to school in Montpellier wanted to come to Switzerland and of course see the Matterhorn. Hence I was able to share the accommodation costs with them. Even better, we stayed in Bern in an AirBnb which made things even more affordable.

Transportation: I got a half price card (demi-tarriff) which makes MOST Swiss trains half price (very good to have if you live in Switzerland). This includes few of the "mountain trains" that takes you up very high with very good views of the Matterhorn.

Now the planning part which was the trickiest. Japanese people in general, do not travel on their own. Most of them sign up with tours that do everything for you including picking you up from your local train station to chaperoning you around the entire time. Think of it as a field trip for adults. So essentially I was basically the tour guide/chaperon having to have to book all accommodation to planning out the day. It also made it difficult that neither of them speak very good English; which can be a problem if you're in the Swiss-German part of the country. This has troubled me a bit but in the end it worked out because I was able to plan mostly according to my own preferences. ;^^

In any case I will put down the itinerary because before I was quite worried that we weren't able to do it all but in fact we were able to pack a lot. I'm sure many are interested in coming to Switzerland (wink wink) so this is just to help with the planning process

Saturday
13:00 meet in Bern station
13:00-15:00 lunch (Rosti)
15:00-16:30 checkin to our accommodation (Airbnb)
16:30-17:30 Rose garden
17:30-19:00 Old City Bern (clock tower, Bern bears, Cathedral)
19:00-21:00 dinner

Sunday
4:00 wake up
6:07-8:13 train to Zermatt
8:13-9:30 explore around city/store luggage
9:30-10:00 Gongernaut train
10:10-10:40 Gongernaut observatory
10:40-12:00 short hike to lake
12:30-13:30 hike and train down to Zermatt
13:30-15:00 lunch (fondue)
15:00-16:30 Souvenir shopping
16:30-20:30 train back to Geneva