Zurich is often introduced as Switzerland’s financial centre, but that only tells part of the story. The city has a remarkably compact historic centre, a lake at its doorstep, excellent museums, neighbourhoods that feel very different from one another and a mountain overlooking it all. That combination makes Zurich easy to explore. You can spend the morning walking through medieval streets, have lunch beside the Limmat, take a boat onto Lake Zurich in the afternoon and still

Zurich is one of the easiest cities in Switzerland to use as a base for exploring the rest of the country. Within an hour or two, you can be walking through another historic city, standing beside one of Europe’s largest waterfalls or heading into the Swiss Alps. The harder question is deciding where to go. Some day trips from Zurich work particularly well by train. Others are easier by car, especially if you want to visit mountain villages or combine several stops in one day.