Switzerland Archives - Page 2 of 2 - Escapes From The Little Red Dot

A brief summary on the itinerary

Escape Plan to Switzerland and France 2015:

Total duration 15D14N
Singapore is 6hrs ahead of Switzerland and France.
Flight time is 12hrs 40mins on Singapore Airlines from Singapore to Zurich.

Morning flight on 12th June at 1:20am and arrival in Zurich at 8am.
Return flight is on the 26th June at 11:45pm and arrival in Singapore at 5:55am.

Day 0 Preparations for long trip and the flight
Day 1 Zurich City
Day 2 Basel and Strasbourg
Day 3 Nancy stopover and Reims
Day 4 Usines Center Paris Nord and Rouen
Day 5 Normandy Beach and Mont St. Michel
Day 6 Blois and Chateau Chambord
Day 7 Chateau Chenonceau and Lyon
Day 8 Galleries Lafayette and Annecy
Day 9 Annecy and Geneva
Day 10 Lausanne and Montreux
Day 11 Zermatt and Riffelalp
Day 12 Gruyere and Bern
Day 13 Brienz, Lungern viewpoint and Lucerne
Day 14 Mt. Rigi and Zurich
Day 15 Home Sweet Home

This escape plan hijacked the initial plans of progressively extending flight time for our baby. The SG50 promo that gave 50% discount on amount of Krisflyer miles redemption on selected destinations were just too good to be missed. What better time to travel to Europe with such low miles required? Zurich was one of the destination and we had to decide between Central Europe or France/Swiss. We chose the latter as it gave more assurance in terms of higher probabilities of modern facilities should we urgently require for our baby.

Budget nature: Euros were somewhat low but high Swiss Francs made the trip a little expensive.

Even without the tickets, the entire trip came up to be around SGD5k for the whole family. The travel in France was rather bearable with the weakened Euros but the Swiss standard of living was just too expensive, made worse with the decoupling of the Francs against the Euros.

Complexity: Getting around in a car was easy in France, but difficult in Swiss.

Driving in France was fairly easy, but long distances to cover. Reststops along the highways were good for rest and lunch. Driving in Swiss was extremely difficult in cities. Parking were hard to find and roads were crowded with other modes of transport. The long distance travel with crying baby in a uncomfortable car made the journey really unpleasant. Tolls along the French highway collect quite a sum of coins while vignette issue in Swiss was covered since we got the car from Zurich first.

A brief summary on the itinerary

Escape Plan to Europe, May 2005:

Total duration 27D26N
London is 7hr behind Singapore while the rest of Europe is 6hrs behind Singapore.
Flight time is 7hrs 25mins on Emirates Airlines from Singapore to Dubai for transfer. Flight time is 7hrs 35mins on Emirate Airlines from Dubai to London Gatwick International Airport.
Flight time is 2hrs 25mins on EasyJet Airlines from London Gatwick to Rome Flumicino.
Return flight is 6hrs 30mins on Emirates Airlines from Paris to Dubai for transfer. Flight time is 7hrs 10mins on Emirates Airlines from Dubai to Singapore.

Early morning flight on 23rd May at 325am and arrival in Dubai in the same morning at 655am. Transfer to another flight in the same morning at 8am and arrive in London at 1235pm on the same day.
Afternoon flight on the 13th Jun at 505pm and arrival in Rome at 830pm.
Return flight from Paris on the 17th Jun at 950pm and arrival in Dubai at 620am the next morning, transfer to another flight in the same morning at 945am and arrive in Singapore 855pm.

Day 1 Arrival into London, exploring London
Day 2 Salisbury and Stonehenge tour
Day 3 Tower Bridge 
Day 4 Brussels 
Day 5 Amsterdam
Day 6 Sankt Goar and Heidelberg
Day 7 Lucern and Lauterbrunnen
Day 8 Jungfrau visit
Day 9 Liechtenstein and Munich 
Day 10 Dachau Concentration Camp and Innsbruck
Day 11 Verona
Day 12 Venice
Day 13 Florence
Day 14 Pisa and Monaco
Day 15 Nice and Cannes
Day 16 Barcelona
Day 17 Barcelona
Day 18 Carcassonne and Bordeaux
Day 19 Paris
Day 20 Paris
Day 21 Paris
Day 22 London
Day 23 Rome
Day 24 Rome and Vatican City
Day 25 Milan
Day 26/27 Home Sweet Home

This escape plan was planned our graduation trip which started off the whole wanderlust. We decided on an almost month long trip with a first visit to Europe. As we were really tight on budget, being recently graduated, we thought it would be great to do a bus tour around Europe with Contiki tour (Day 4 till Day 21), which offered more places to see without breaking the bank! And they say the rest was history.

Budget nature: Not cheap

It was not cheap to go to Europe during times when Euros were almost twice our currency. We managed to get good flight prices through Emirates and we tried to save up on accommodation living in hostels and eating bread for quite some days in order not to spend too much.

Complexity: Easy

Major European cities were very well connected by public transport which we used to get around while exploring. The major part of getting from city to city was taken care by the coach. Domestic flights and interstate trains were easy to arrange as well.