A lot of people have been asking me how much it cost me to visit Switzerland, which is rather notorius for being very expensive.
At the time I set this vacation up, the exchange rate for Swiss Francs (CHF) was very good - 1.63 CHF to $1 US. That's the highest I've seen it in some time.
This is the run down on the costs:
$405 - Roundtrip airfare, San Francisco to Zurich on Lufthansa
$535 - 6 nights hotel with hardboard (dinner), including a 4 day lift ticket
$23 - Youth hostel, Zurich
Total for hotel and airfare: $963
I got the airfare that cheap for one simple reason - the second week of January to the end of March is the slow season for the airlines, and they tend to drop fares to fill up airplanes. I got my airfare from Expedia.
All I had to pay for was train travel, lunch, and any other items I bought over there (chocolate, clothes, etc.). Otherwise, everything was paid for. Overall, I spent about $1,100. As one of my coworkers put it, "You got this trip so cheap that there's a wanted poster with your picture on it at the Post Office".
I looked at many packages through various outfits and saw nothing cheaper than $1,500 - without lift tickets! I got this very cheap because I shopped around using various Internet resources. The best thing I did was contacting the Engelberg Tourist Center. It turned out that they had a special for late March (when I was planning on arriving) that included a 4 day lift ticket with 6 nights hotel. You paid about 30CHF extra for the halfboard, which was worth it. At my hotel, I ended up with a very well prepared four course dinner every evening.
If you are planning a trip to Europe, my advise is this:
1) Do your homework - find out as much as you can about any specials for hotel, airfare, or whatever. You will probably save several hundred dollars setting up your trip on your own instead of going with a package.
2) Check the exchange rates. If they're favorable, then it will help out on your expenditures.
3) Contact the local tourist office in the area you are planning on visiting. Get some brochures. They might have a better package deal, and they can arrange credit card payment on the spot. It worked for me.
4) When buying expensive items, use a credit card. This gives you the best exchange rate.
5) Make a reasonable estimate of the amount of money you will need to take along with you. Personally, I think I brought too much. But then again, I figure too much money is better than too little - you can always kill the remaining portion of your money buying souveneirs and such at the airport. I planned for 1-2 expensive days of shopping, which didn't happen partly because I had problems with European clothing sizes.
6) If you want to save yourself some time running around for a bank to get foreign currency, Chase Manhattan Bank has a "Currency To Go" service that's very good. They have about 75 different currencies available. I used it, and the convienience was worth it. They ship the currency overnight to you for a $10 handling fee for transactions below $500. Otherwise, it's free. They charge it to your credit card (as a purchase, not a cash advance!), and you get the cash exchange rate, which is approximately the credit card rate plus 4%.
7) Plan how much travel you will do by train. If you are planning a lot, then it's worthwhile to get a Europass, Swiss Pass, or similar rail pass that's good for a given time period or for several countries. In my case, it made little sense as I was doing little train travel. Besides, the fares were reasonably cheap anyway.