Meeting Your Trip in BRIG or ZERMATT

This page offers help (concrete or informational) on reaching your trip, for riders whose trips assemble in either Brig or in Zermatt. Topics include...

1. Where you Join Your Trip (see immediately below)
2. Our “Access Packages,” designed to help you to do so.
3. Suggestions on how to time your trip to the trip, whether you are having us arrange your travel, or doing it yourself.
4. Service information regarding train travel to your trip start location.
5. Suggested pre-trip visits, especially when these are not geographically obvious, but are rendered economical and convenient by direct rail connections.
6. Hopefully helpful hints for those setting up their own travel to the trip.

If you wish to arrange some or all of your travel through us, please tell us what by means of this response questionnaire, designed to collect all the information we need to be able to book your travel.

1. WHERE and WHEN Do You Join Your Trip?

If your trip starts in Brig (“Italian Lakes,” and most trips beginning with the Italian Lakes itinerary): it trips assembles in Brig, at the railroad station, on the afternoon of its start date (generally Sunday, but Saturday in July 2008). We meet on the west end of platform 1, between 2:30p and 4:30p.

If your trip starts in Zermatt (“Mozart and the Matterhorn”): the meet is at the hotel on Thursday evening (at no particular time).

We will send you details of meeting time and place with your final itinerary.

If you wish to make your own way to the trip (in other words, not to set up your travel arrangements through us), a couple of hints on getting there are offered at the bottom of this page.


2. Our ACCESS PACKAGES
as of January 1, 2008

The closest intercontinental airport (to either Brig or Zermatt) is Milan Malpensa, but travelling from Geneva is easier, since trains run directly from the airport. Our “Access Package” includes an “open” rail ticket from either (reservations are not required on these lines). Our London “Access Package” includes a train from London to Paris, and on to Brig or Zermatt. Other options are available, from Zurich, Paris, or elsewhere.

Base (Starting) Access Package Price: 36 € to Brig, 59 € to Zermatt.
If you are a North American traveller, the $ price (US or Canadian) on your price chart applies until 35 days prior to trip departure. Otherwise euro prices are transcribed to your invoice in its currency, converted at the exchange rate of the day on which the package is requested (rounded to the nearest whole dollar or pound). Current “mid-market” rates can be consulted from the site we use for conversion. We use the mid-market rate on the day of conversion, and add 2% to cover currency broker exchange commissions (our conversion rates are thus as good as, or better than, any you could obtain, including via your credit card, unless you are a professional currency trader).

Availability is normally guaranteed until 35 days prior to trip start (payment received by us). Within 35 days, availability must be confirmed, and costs may be slightly higher (especially the costs of shipping rail tickets). Some extra-cost options have higher prices if ordered w/in 35 days.

Included:

• 2nd class daylight train tickets to Brig or Zermatt (depending on your trip start point) from Geneva, Milan, or from Gallarate (the closest rail station to Milan Malpensa airport). The Zermatt price can also be used if you are going there before a trip meeting in Brig. However, it does not include hotels, nor the train back to Brig.
• A printed schedule / itinerary, highlighting any connections.
• Our “Route Sheet to the Trip,” helping you through your journey.
• A reserved seat if you are coming from Milan / Gallarate (trains on this line require reservations). Reservations are not available on trains from Geneva, but they are also pointless: you will find plenty of “walk-on” space.
  

Options Offered at an Extra Cost (subject to availability)
Prices are in addition to the “Base” Access Package Price. For a general discussion of train upgrades, see here. Topics include the relative comfort of first versus second class, and different types of accommodation available on overnight trains.

• Tickets from Zurich or Zurich Airport: +27€ 2nd class, +58€ 1st class. Discount 1st class tickets are sometimes available at +34€, availability is essentially dependant on total volume of rail travel
• Tickets from Paris: +49€ 2nd class, +89€ 1st class. Tickets include TGV supplement and reservation charge, and are not refundable or exchangeable once ordered (add 26€ in either class for tickets which can be modified until the day prior to travel, and refunded less 20%). Discount 1st class tickets are sometimes available at +75€. TGV reservation charge included.
  “Ride the Bike Train Discount.” Coming from Paris? If you are willing to help move the bikes, we deputize you and offer a 29€ fare (total). You leave Paris circa 8a, and connect in Lausanne. Only two tickets are available per trip departure at this fare.
• First class train tickets (in lieu of 2nd class): From Geneva: 14 € discount rate, 27 € regular rate. From Milan or Gallarate: 13 € (rate always available). 1st class upgrade is not valid on cog railway from Brig up to Zermatt, if that is your final destination. The ticket on the cog railway can be upgraded on board, if desired (circa 20 Swiss francs).
• Paris airport train tickets, from Charles de Gaulle or Orly to Paris center. Follow this link for details.
  

Alternate Arrangements, in lieu of our usual packages (subject to availability)
Prices are complete (in other words, they are not in addition to the “Base” Access Package Price)

• Tickets from London. 139€ if you are also purchasing tickets back to London, 169€ if not, or if you prefer a changeable return (in 1st class, add 179€ or 249€; 1st class tickets include meal service). Add a further 28€ if travelling by overnight train. See “Service Information,” below, to see why you might do this.
  - Upgrade on overnight train: + a further 52€ / person to double sleeping car cabin, 109€ to private single cabin.
• Alpine cog railway ticket only (no other rail or hotel nights): 22€, 41€ round-trip (2nd class).

3. TIMING Your Trip

Brig is a pretty, small, town, with a massive railway station (it must have more trains per capita than any place on the planet). It will not hurt you to arrive a bit early and stroll around. A pretty old fortified monastery is probably the highlight, but the whole town is pleasant. We have a “Blue Marble” hotel there, if desired (see “Individual Hotels...”).

Zermatt defies description.


4. Service Information
Schedules are approximate – exact timetables can be consulted at http://www.raileurope.com/us/rail/fares_schedules/index.htm.
Best trains are mentioned. Others are slower or have multiple connections.

All travel times are to Brig. Add 90 minutes if you are connecting on the alpine train to Zermatt.

• From Milan. Trip time: 2 hours. Service is generally every two hours.
• From Gallarate: as for Milan, above, but the trip is 30 minutes shorter.
• From Geneva or Geneva Airport. Travel time is 2.5 hours, service is every half hour.
• From Zurich (airport or city center). Travel time is circa 2 hours (2'20" from the airport); service is hourly.
• From Paris. To Brig: depart circa 8a (same-day connections from London or from trans-Atlantic flights are not possible). This is a 6-hour trip, with one change of train, on any of three different routes. If you’re travelling to Zermatt, the above trains are complimented by another at 1p.
  
• From London. Total trip to Brig is between 9 and 11 hours, a long trip. But, before you book a flight... flying takes 7+ once terminal trips are factored in (over 9 if your flight comes in at a Milan airport other than Malpensa). It is less reliable, less comfortable, and generally more expensive once connecting ground costs are factored in.
  
  Rail travellers to Brig must depart the day prior to the trip start, and plan on a night en route, or in Brig. The last “comfortable” daylight service all the way through departs from London at 1p. There are also services to either Brig or to Zermatt at 8a and 10a.
  
  If you would rather a bed on a train than a bed in a building, you can depart London (on the Eurostar for Paris) as late as 4p the night before the date of your desired arrival in Brig or Zermatt. You then travel overnight between Paris and Milan, connecting at 7a to Brig (10a arrival in Brig, noon arrival in Zermatt). Prices for this option are quoted, including sleeping car upgrades.

5. Suggested PRE-TRIP VISITS

(1) We suggest our “Glacier Experience,” a trip on the famous “Glacier Express” narrow gauge train, which follows the spine of the Alps over the Furka pass. The package price includes:

• Train to Disentis from Zurich or Zurich Airport (3 hours).
• A Friday hotel night in Disentis.
• A Saturday voyage on the “Glacier Express,” in her all-1st class, glass-enclosed panoramic car, to Brig.

Travel to Disentis is available from other points at an additional cost (travel from London is at the same cost as travel from London to Brig). Package price is 179 € / person double occupancy, 199 € single.

(2) If your trip meets in Brig, visit the nearby Alpine resort of Zermatt before you start. Glacier skiing (slopes open until early summer, and from early fall), glorious hiking, and lots of fondue, with the Matterhorn as a spectacular backdrop. We offer a hotel and discount train tickets on the cog railway that climbs to the town.

(3) Combinations are also possible: start with the “Glacier Experience,” and follow with a couple of days in Zermatt....

6. Hints on TRAVELLING INDEPENDENTLY to the Trip
Guests subscribing to an “Access Package” need not read this section.

See also “Timing Your Trip” and “Service Information,” above, as either of these may additionally help.

We gladly provide travel consulting (schedule or routing information) concerning pre-trip individual travel. In particular, we have invested a great deal to become railway experts. Our service fees are reasonable: a 20€ charge for all but the most complex projects – or the most simple (for instance, only a 10€ charge applies if the service is limited to the preparation of a routine rail ticket). You will generally find them well-justified by the time they will save you in research, standing on line, overpaying for your tickets, or all three.

But, for some, this type of research is fun. So, here are some hints, intended to start off hardened “do-it-yourselfers.”

Trains. Schedules for all routes can be consulted on this web site:
http://www.raileurope.com/us/rail/fares_schedules/index.htm

Brig is at the nexus of the European railway network, despite being surrounded by huge Alps. Getting here is laugably easy. Bon voyage! Zermatt is 90 minutes above Brig via a fantastically expensive cog railway. If you are going there, you can order this ticket through us, at a slightly lower cost.

Planes. Geneva, Zurich, and Milan Malpensa are best. Milan Linate (Easyjet, many interior European flights) and Bergamo or Verona/Brescia (Ryanair) are on the wrong side of Milan vis-à-vis Brig / Zermatt, and so add about 2 hours to the trip.


If you wish to arrange some or all of your travel through us, please tell us what by means of this response questionnaire, designed to collect all the information we need to be able to book your travel.