The scenery – and delicacies – get better and better for our slow travel expert as she takes a local train through Canton Fribourg to a beautiful medieval village It was a handpainted sign on a wooden barn that piqued my interest in Gruyères. I was travelling from Emmental to Montreux last year, following the wonderful Golden Pass rail route. Our train paused at Montbovon, the start of a steep climb up to the line’s final dramatic mountain pass. There was the prospect of stunning views of Lake Geneva ahead. To the right of the railway, I spotted the bold sign: “La Gruyère vous salue” (the chee ..read more

The world’s first hammock hiking trail in southern Switzerland takes hikers into quiet corners of the Alps – with their beds in their backpack for lazy pit stops and overnight stays It was a summer’s morning in the Lepontine Alps in Ticino, Switzerland’s Italian-speaking canton, and there was the vague threat of a storm on the horizon. I was already out on a trail through larch and hazelnut forest, backpack shouldered, aiming for a mountain pass. Up ahead, a herd of short-haired goats grazed, their bells chiming merrily, while behind me the peaks that tower over the Maggia Valley shu ..read more

Our slow travel expert alights from the express train in Domodossola to discover a rural route through the hills into Switzerland Frequent Eurocity trains dash north from Milan via the Simplon Tunnel to Switzerland. On the way to the tunnel, those express trains speed by Lake Maggiore, affording fine views of the Borromean Islands. For Switzerland-bound trains, the last station stop in Italy is at the small Piedmont town of Domodossola. The station here is remarkably grand, as befits what was once an important gateway into Italy, with all the paraphernalia of customs and immigration. From Domo ..read more

David Bowie’s Berlin bolthole and the world’s most stolen artwork in Ghent are among the cultural icons that our writers have long wished to visit When you have a partner obsessed with architecture, you can’t expect to go on holiday without a detour to see some building or another. So if it’s a city break, that usually means a walking tour of the architectural highlights interspersed with visits to art galleries ..read more

A high-altitude ski touring trip among the 4,000-metre peaks of the Bernese Alps proves a tough challenge and a valuable lesson in mountain skills One Thursday last March I emerged from the Jungfraujoch, Europe’s highest train station, and crossed into another world. Inside the station, a guide with a novelty Swiss flag was marshalling a party of Asian visitors. Outside, we were soon on the Jungfraufirn, a small glacier that feeds the Aletsch, the largest glacier in the Alps. Sunlight shone through breaks in the cloud, and the ice, flanked by buttresses of dark rock, ran south for miles. The p ..read more

Holidays for skiers, hikers, skaters – and those who’d rather just relax in a luxury spa ​One of the most picturesque villages in the Tirol, Alpbach is not the place for a rip-roaring après ski scene, but its clutch of classic wooden chalet hotels, traditional stube restaurants and quiet bars make it a great choice for a restorative mountain break. Alongside the perfectly groomed pistes accessed by the Wiedersbergerhorn gondola, are easy snow-shoeing trails, a 7km toboggan run and torchlit hikes. Mountain huts dot the Alpbachtal-Wildschönau valley, serving käsespätzle (Tirolean macaroni cheese ..read more

We asked 23 Guardian travel writers to share their best experiences of 2023, from elegant spas and an art deco cinema to a new ‘megalith’ and a futuristic hotel There are many places where you expect to see jaw-dropping architecture, but the quiet Brittany countryside isn’t one of them. As we walked toward Hotel l’Essenciel (not a typo, ciel means sky) with its 36 rooms, or “nests” suspended around its central structure, with the flying-saucer shaped restaurant La Table des Pères at its foot, I had to wonder if I’d stepped into a parallel universe or on to another planet ..read more

Switzerland is not the most affordable place to ski, but the Jungfrau area – with super-fast pistes and long toboggan runs – is a happy exception I’m a budget-conscious skier, so Switzerland is rarely on my radar. Sure, resorts such as St Moritz, Zermatt and Verbier are world-class, but I’ve always assumed they have sky-high prices to match. My last ski trip was to wallet-friendly Andorra. A quick check of the Post Office’s annual ski resort report confirmed my suspicions: Switzerland is consistently the priciest destination in Europe, while Bulgaria, Italy, Austria and Andorra offer more affo ..read more

This exhilarating, nine-hour journey trundles through the Swiss and Austrian Alps and soars to more than 1,000 metres above sea level as it crosses the Rhine-Danube watershed Every great railway station needs a guardian angel. Zurich has one of the quirkiest. A colourful sculpture of a curvaceous, swimsuit-clad woman with golden wings hovers over the main concourse at the city’s Hauptbahnhof. L’ange protecteur by French artist Niki de Saint Phalle is as intriguing as the busy departure boards. With direct trains to destinations across 10 countries, this station is rich in possibilities. Anywhe ..read more

A trek on the Aletsch glacier in Switzerland’s Bernese Alps is dazzling, but also a stark example of the damage caused by global warming Seven of us are roped in a line, with hiking poles in our hands and crampons on our boots. Led by our guide, David, we take it in turns to step from rock into the marbled grey ice beyond. I hesitate before taking my step; the act feels oddly disrespectful. It takes a few minutes to trust that the spikes will hold their grip, but I get used to the crunching rhythm and the occasional tug of the rope. The summer sunshine is warm but a coldness radiates from belo ..read more