11
Nov
17 Minute Read
17 Minute Read
At the early part of 2024, I got to thinking about what I should do about a big birthday coming up (let’s not talk about which one!). I love travel, and better yet, I love traveling with my bike to ride it in new and unique places.
I had already been to Girona (twice!), France (also twice!), and the Dolomites, what did I want to do next?
Switzerland came to mind. I’ve had a fascination with the country since a college course I took years ago where we each picked a country to do a public speaking presentation for it (it was a communications class). Since Zürich has a tech scene, it makes sense that the country would pique my interest.
Looking back on the trip now, I can’t tell you how many times I would sit back or look up and think “how can this place even be real?”
Or simply this is awesome.
Or this looks like a postcard.
Switzerland is known to most people for its chocolate, watches, and possibly its gold and banking practices. Well, and that it’s expensive, which I’ll definitely second.
There’s definitely more to the country, of course, but I sailed out on a journey to discover it for myself.
I’ve written about it before, but ride planning is something that I enjoy doing and, personally, I like to think it’s something I have a knack for doing. I wanted to flex some muscles I wasn’t fully sure I had.
So I planned an entire trip in a foreign country that I had never been to with two other friends.
This meant a lot of scouring the internet for resources, route details, researching train and travel schedules, locating accommodations, the whole thing. Perhaps that sounds exhausting to you, but I enjoyed doing it.
I also enjoy documenting my journeys, and this one has proved to be my greatest endeavor yet! I split out a lot of my content across 12 (yes, 12!) different posts across the site. Basically it breaks down like this:
In short, I managed to explore a circular route through the majority of the country. Awesome! But instead of writing up one giant blog post to discuss it all, I’ll write out more detail on each of the areas we visited.
We started out in Bern, but didn’t do any riding there. It’s only about an hour’s train ride from Zürich. Personally, I thought this place was one of the most livable places I’ve ever been.
It was clean, beautiful, laid back, and despite being a tourist, I didn’t feel like I was being a bother to people, and in fact, was even welcomed in some ways (hats off to the friendly people at the Coffee Coaching Club!).
What’s particularly great about Bern is that if you are staying overnight at a hotel or (in most cases) an AirBnB, you get a free public transit pass! It even works on your way to your hotel, too, as long as you show the train operator your reservation.
Also, don’t forget to swim in the Aare river and visit one of the free (yes, free!) public pools in the city. We stopped in at the Freibad Marzili and it was awesome. I particularly liked how you would walk through a small wading pool before leaving or entering each of the pools.
Of course, don’t forget to check out the Zytglogge in town, especially around noon to see all the festivities around it. You can actually book a tour to go inside and see the original mechanism that still works the same today. We did, and it was well worth the time!
If you need a bike shop or two to visit, or need some supplies before riding or continuing onward, I’d recommend:
We then moved on to Interlaken, known for its location between two beautiful lakes, Lake Thun and Lake Brienz. It is also home to a lot of sky sports such as skydiving and hang-gliding. It’s only about an hour away from Bern, following the same train line if coming from Zürich.
This was the first place on the trip where we actually rode our bikes. And when I look back on the trip, I’m reminded with how much we (not just me!) liked this area. Which is especially curious to me, considering that it wasn’t an area I had originally thought would be a highlight of the trip!
The famous Lauterbrunnen valley is reachable from here, by bike and by public transit. For those not familiar with it, Lauterbrunnen is probably the most picturesque place representative of Switzerland. Imagine chalets, misty waterfalls, fondue, cows, the whole gamut of Swiss culture. It’s also known as the “valley of 72 waterfalls”.
Fun fact, we went to Interlaken primarily for one specific climb! The Grosse Scheidegg, which is an amazing journey that starts in fertile valleys, passes up through fern-filled canyons, and eventually takes you over an alpine pass into the picturesque Grindelwald on the other side.
Next on the itinerary was Andermatt, the original highlight of the trip! It’s a ski town at 4700 feet above sea level, known to many for its proximity to many ski slopes, but also home to the official big cycling climbs of Switzerland.
It’s here that you’ll see so many of the famous climbs that are regularly featured in the Tour de Suisse, and even movie history! The Furkapass was featured in the James Bond movie Goldfinger.
From Andermatt you can visit many of these climbs, all from the same base location, which really is quite stellar when you think about it. And these are the climbs that take most of us 2 hours or more to climb by bike! I especially love how these climbs magically take you up in altitude faster than you’d think, but also continue on for longer than you’d think, as if the road appears out of the sky to continue on further and further.
Additionally, Andermatt is also well connected to multiple train lines, so there’s no need for a car. We found a great AirBnB that had the space for 3 of us and our bike boxes, and I really enjoyed our experience there.
Keep in mind that its typically much colder in Andermatt than the other places I visited on this trip, so even in the summer you’re going to want to have some cold gear, if only for the long alpine descents. When we arrived, it definitely took us by surprise, so we absolutely raided the local shops!
Given that you could plan an entire Swiss adventure out of Andermatt, it makes sense to go into more detail in a separate post.
Sadly, after our amazing riding in Andermatt, I had to part ways with my two friends. They each had other adventures to attend to. I continued on solo to Lugano, where suddenly it got really hot outside and everyone started speaking Italian.
It’s an absolutely beautiful region of the world, lesser known for its cycling perhaps, and more for its shopping and dolce vita with a Swiss twist.
It also happens to be near the Italian lake region, a place I had visited in 2019, which I was able to revisit again this time. From a different direction, of course.
I thoroughly enjoyed riding through this region, but I was shocked at just how warm it got and how steep some of the climbs were! None of them were that long, but I experienced steeper climbs here than in any other part of my entire trip!
The amount of variety in this region is quite fantastic, too, as you can find yourself along many different lake fronts across two different countries, riding along inland connecting roads through old train paths, and climbing up through nestled roads leading you up to hills overlooking it all.
Definitely don’t forget to check out Sartoria Ciclistica (located here) if you make it to Como! You can get there by train from Lugano if you’re not up to riding it. They’re a fun club / shop with a lot of unique colors, designs, and quality gear. They always seem to be doing something interesting over there, so go over there and Ride like a Laghée!
After closing out my hotel tab in Lugano, I hopped on another train and went back to Zürich, hoping for some cooler temperatures for the last portion of my trip. With some rain, it did cool down, but it definitely was still quite warm!
It wasn’t any less beautiful though.
Zürich is a seriously cool city, one that punches way above its weight, and definitely has a sense of class to it. I loved how it felt like a world-class city on its own, but getting outside of it on the bike was a simple task and didn’t even take long.
You could see wheat fields that were gold in the sun just east of the city, while also passing through quiet neighborhood suburbs filled with large (and likely expensive) chalet style homes. I was able to ride into Germany and visit the Rhine river in person, then see the summer retreat of Lake Ägerisee, each within a relatively reachable distance of the city.
I was also surprised at just how quiet downtown Zürich was, too, especially later in the day and despite the number of pedestrians that were around. Even Will Smith thought so! No one seemed to be particularly loud or obnoxious, though, which definitely is a very Swiss thing that I’ve since grown to love.
If you ever visit Zürich, definitely check out Cycle Store Zürich! They’re an amazing store with some great, high-end gear, along with some nice kit specifically branded to them. I spoke with an employee there who has been working at the shop for a long, who also used to live in the Bay Area, so it was fun to chat a bit about the differences between our respective cities.
They’re located right in town, and have a fantastic “ride like a local” portion of their website with a ton of specific routes for you to try!
Clearly, with 12 posts dedicated to this trip, I have a lot of thoughts on the trip! You’re welcome to read through all of them if you’re planning anything similar, as my thoughts are definitely contained throughout them all.
This ended being a big portion of the trip on its own, particularly since Switzerland is known the world over for its incredible transportation system. I’ve written quite a bit more on the top in its own post, covering how tickets and half fare cards work, along with how to get around and what my experience there was like.
Check it out!
There is definitely something truly world class about the roads I experienced in Switzerland. I’m not a civil engineer or anything, so I can’t exactly put my finger on the why, but the road conditions there were just sublime.
What this really translated to was that descents were amazing. I regularly spun out my gearing downhill and didn’t even feel like it was that fast. Switchbacks, descents, insane views, and even in wet weather (like the 40km downhill descent we did on the south side of the Lukmanierpass), it all felt smooth and I was always in control.
A point to mention around this point is the Gotthardpass. It’s an incredibly important north-south connection pass that basically separates Northern Europe from Southern Europe, and at this point, there are basically four separate ways to get through it. The “original” way is the famous “Gotthardpass” that cyclists specifically seek out, because it’s a historic road that is beautifully cobbled (by hand! I saw them myself), and largely avoided by most drivers because there are far-more-efficient ways to get through there.
It’s definitely a bit bumpy, especially going down, but there are trains that connect both ends that you can take if you want to ride up and down one way without doubling back.
I guess this is a similar point to the above, but in general, I think there is a better sense of decorum and rule-following in Switzerland when it comes to driving. It’s definitely a stereotype of the Swiss, for sure.
While I still think the drivers in Mallorca and Spain are more patient, I found the Swiss drivers to be generally patient too, not passing you when unsafe to do so (compared to what I see basically every single day here in the US).
What I directly observed that I really liked was that when you were riding your bike close enough to the speed limit (a lot of towns have limits of 30km/h, which is totally doable on the bike), drivers didn’t feel the need to ride directly behind you or speed beyond the limit just to pass you.
If that last part doesn’t resonate with you, then perhaps you’re reading this from outside of the US, because it happens all the time here. For some reason, car-brains really just have to get around you, even if it means getting to that red light at the same time you do.
The mountain passes around Andermatt are incredibly popular with the motorbiking and supercar community, too. Just like us cyclists are out there enjoying the roads, so too are people visiting from all over with their massive motorcycle groups or fancy (and I do mean fancy) cars.
In most cases, they’re fine, but keep your wits about you. I’ve definitely seen some drivers and riders come way too close considering the rest of the road, and it’s clear that not everyone drives the way the Swiss do.
Luckily, most of the passes through there have really good visibility, so you can often see (and hear) groups like this coming up or down the mountain before they’re right on you.
Hotels are expensive in Switzerland (well, everywhere these days, amirite?). However, in my case with planning for three people, AirBnB options were the way to go. It afforded us larger spaces for sleeping and for setting up bikes (bike boxes are big, remember) and often came with a clothes washer and possibly even a dryer.
On a longer trip with bikes involved, you tend to collect a lot of sweaty clothes, and you’re likely not bringing more than three or four sets of kit, so having some kind of laundry system other than the sink is incredibly helpful to have. Since technical gear doesn’t require drying (and in fact specifically says not to do it), you really only need a washer, which is pretty much the norm in most of Europe.
I wrote more about this in a previous post if you’re interested!
Final point to keep in mind is that AirBnB has been a bit disruptive in places like Europe where regulation by various governments is more direct, so its future is a bit less clear over there. At least that’s my read on it in 2024.
I was surprised at how varied the weather was around the country when I was there. In Interlaken, we had rain and mild temperatures, in Andermatt it was surprisingly cold for summer with a lot of threatening clouds at times, and then in Lugano I was sweating like crazy.
The weather application on my Apple phone generally seemed like a good starting point for gauging the weather, but keep in mind the the percentage chance for rain is not exactly how a lot of us think it is - something like 35% means that only 35% of the covered region is going to get rain, not necessarily that there’s a 35% chance of rain.
Either way, be prepared. And when going over the big mountain passes, always, always, always bring some kind of jacket, even in the middle of summer. Bring one that has rain repellant as well, since you’re also very likely to experience that as well.
Please don’t underestimate the mountains. These passes are all over 8000 feet above sea level (2000+ meters) and can be extremely unpredictable.
Switzerland is primarily split up into three regions:
The last one threw me for a loop when I first got to the country. I had been trying to learn a bit of German before the trip, only to realize that a lot of what I was learning was basically just wrong. And then it was confusing.
Most language apps don’t teach Swiss-German, and it seems to have taken many things from French when you wouldn’t think that it would. What made this worse for me though was that some of the similar sounding phrases actually meant other words.
So for example, in German, bitte is “please”, but in Swiss-German, it’s often said as “you’re welcome” following a “thank you” (which is Danke as in German, in most cases).
But then “thank you” in Swiss-German is merci, just like in French.
All the numbers are very different, too.
I don’t know, it’s all confusing to me, and I’ve heard the same from others, but I do remember several locals lighting up a bit when you would make the effort to say grüezi, merci, and then bitte.
Honestly, all of it.
I loved getting around without a car, and that the transit options were so good and so plentiful.
Everyone generally was nice enough to me, but largely seemed to be capable of doing their own thing while also making sure they weren’t inconveniencing me, either. The Swiss are definitely a rule-following culture, and it’s something that I’ve weirdly grown to appreciate.
I’m also really happy that everything went off without a hitch. No issues, no medical emergencies, and no travel problems getting around. Sure, packing the bike in and out of the box was a bit annoying at times, but having the opportunity to explore this country by bike was worth it.
This trip was also really special to me simply because I was able to enjoy it with two close friends of mine. I love playing tour guide, and having a chance to do this in a way that even remotely resembled previous trips I’ve done made me very excited.
Oh yeah, absolutely. So far, Switzerland is probably the closest I’ve felt to a place that I could legitimately call home for some amount of time outside of the US. Sometimes people call it boring, depending on what your frame of reference is, often it’s Paris or London, but if you’re a nature lover or enjoy mobility and a high quality of life, Switzerland is really high up on the list. It delivers. I actually felt after three weeks that I wasn’t quite ready to go home!
So yeah, please read through my content and reach out if you have questions. I’m happy to share anything and everything I can that’s related to this trip! It was amazing.
Auf Wiedersehen!
