When we spent just over 2 weeks in Germany and Switzerland in 2023, it certainly made me realize that I’m not the beach person I thought I was (being originally from the Caribbean and all of that), but that I actually love the mountains! We went to Germany first, then through Switzerland in a roughly north to south path, only backtracking to fly out of Berlin’s Brandenburg airport at the end of the trip. Based on our research, late Spring was the perfect time to visit Europe because the temperatures were in the 60s to 70s F (between 16 to 25 C) with sunny, clear blue skies, no summer heat; not to mention less crowds and lower prices than the tourists bring in the Summer. Our trip covered 4 cities and towns in Germany, and 3 cities and villages in Switzerland, with the best train rides, to-die-for natural scenery, surprisingly delicious food (the ice cream in Munich was amazing) and a little fun thrown in. Thank you, Rick Steves!
We started our 16-day itinerary when we flew in mid-May to Berlin, with 1 stop at La Guardia International Airport, and landed just around 8:00 AM in the morning. We spent several days in Berlin taking in famous sights like the Brandenburg Gate and Museum Island with its 5 awe-inspiring museums, before heading northwest to Hamburg. Hamburg was a choice because I was taking German lessons on iTalki (which is a great site to find language lessons from Community Teachers or qualified teachers!), and my teacher with whom I was taking conversational German lessons was from Hamburg. We actually planned to meet up, and I was stoked to meet her since we had spent the whole previous year and a half talking on Skype at least twice a week!
After spending 3 days exploring chic-looking Hamburg, we took the train and headed south to Munich. Trains, by the way, are the best ways to travel throughout the continent. It was actually really easy to find the best routes, buy tickets and seat reservations (yes, that is a thing, unless you want to be on a full train and no seat for a multi-hour journey). We used an easy-to-use app called Rail Europe to buy tickets on the local trains when traveling within the cities, and another app called Rail Planner to buy the Eurail Global Pass, which is best when you’re traveling through multiple countries.
We absolutely loved Munich! We realized that one of the best ideas to quickly see the best sights in a large city is to do a bike tour. We found an excellent one on Get Your Guide, but Viator was good for other tours as well, plus it was good to compare prices between both and choose the best one as the itineraries were very similar. Walking through the famous Englisher Garten, a 1.4 square mile city park ((almost 1,000 acres, making it one of the largest city parks in the world) was a stroller’s dream. It’s actually the #2 thing to do in Munich, according to US News and World Report and one of the best parts of our Munich visit, with its river surfing, loads of beautiful walking trails, small rivers with people relaxing on the river-bank lawns (no nude bathers as it was Spring and still cool, thankfully). The huge beer garden, where we had beer with meaty, savory pork knuckles, and German potato salad made with vinegar instead of mayonnaise made our day! I had no idea this deliciousness existed and made sure to try a recipe I found online when I got back to the U.S. It was almost as good, so that means I need to go back.
We finally left Munich and headed on a day trip to a lovely town called Garmisch-Partenkirchen at the foot of the Bavarian Alps, with its quaint, traditional German decorated buildings. If you ever do this trip, the Partnach Gorge is a must! Even the walk along the river to get there was a treat.
We finally left Germany and headed south to Switzerland, where we ended up in the lovely Lucerne, with its famous Chapel Bridge that has existed since around 1333!
After Lucerne and an amazing Lake Lucerne cruise, we took the train to our new favorite location in all of Switzerland, Lauterbrunnen – a small village the Lauterbrunnen Valley that was like walking through a living postcard with towering green mountains on all sides, and waterfalls that you can stand and count. This is our must-return destination in Switzerland! 
Our last place to visit was Zermatt, the southernmost part of the trip, and another beautiful Alpine town to explore. No trip to Zermatt would be complete without taking the breathtaking cable-car ride up to the Matterhorn and the Matterhorn Glacier Paradise with its ice carvings and trail that you can explore deep into the mountain glacier. We had to take about 3 cable-car rides to reach the top and each was breathtaking with views of snowy mountains and glaciers. Since we were not accustomed to such high altitudes and the Matterhorn Glacier Paradise is 12,736 feet (3,883 meters) high, we were slightly short of breath when we got to the viewing area at the top. We certainly didn’t care, there were no words to describe that feeling of being at the top of the world, shortness of breath and all.
Of course, all good things must come to an end, so we finally had our day-long train ride back to Berlin before flying out to the U.S. It was certainly a bucket list trip, and we enjoyed every part of it! Thankfully, I had done a lot of research on the train system, train routes, hotels, best activities, and day trips. We used Airalo for e-sim cards for our phones which were very well-priced depending on the length of stay you’re planning to do. This trip truly opened our appetite for more travel around the world and we’ve been to other places since then, so more to come!
Be well,
Juliet
