A Luxury Alpine Train Journey Through Switzerland

Begin in German-speaking Gstaad, one of the most exclusive ski resorts come wintertime that returns to the traditional rural ways in the green summer months. This small Alpine village is known for its high-profile guests, luxury hotels and high-end restaurants with traditional Swiss cuisine. Take a stroll in Gstaad and you’ll find boutiques, art galleries and shops, as well as picture-perfect chalets fitted with charming wooden shutters and window boxes overflowing with flowers.

Don your walking boots to hike nearby trails, sit back and relax in one of the cable cars that wind their way through valleys and gorges, or enjoy an aperitif and fine dining while drinking in the views.

Traditional Alpine architecture abounds in fairytale Zermatt, with wooden shutters adorning windows and pine lodges stretching up the valley side. The town is traffic-free and many choose to hop on bicycles to make their way around. Zermatt is renowned as an important mountaineering centre, with a dozen peaks over 4000m within easy access of the resort, but dominating the skyline here is the solitary Matterhorn.

Enjoy an evening in the Alpine village of Andermatt. The village’s narrow streets are lined with traditional chalets. A short walk into Ursern Valley brings you to the Devil’s Bridge, which spans the sheer Schöllenen Gorge.

With backdrops of forests blanketed in snow and dramatic peaks cutting into cobalt skies, lakeside St. Moritz is as picturesque an Alpine destination as you could imagine. In the eastern Swiss canton of Graubünden, it’s the original Alps playground, attracting royalty for some 150 years. The town is more than equipped to cater for discerning crowds, both in the winter and sun-drenched summers.

Your last stop is the Canton of Ticino, a bright, Italianate place of glamorous lakeside towns and rustic mountain villages, where you’ll explore some of its most scenic valleys and the castles of Bellinzona. Sharing more of its border with Italy than Switzerland, Italian is the only official language in Ticino, and great swathes of culture, culinary tradition and history are shared with neighbouring Lombardy and Piedmont. There are some 4000km of hiking trails snaking out across the mountains, wild swimming in the beautiful Valle Verzasca, boating, mountain biking and rustic villages to discover. The Italian cities of Como and Varese are easily reachable too.