Switzerland Trip

These Roman ruins by the Rhein are Switzerland’s largest, and the last remnants of a colony founded in 43 BC that had grown to 20,000 citizens by the 2nd century. Today, restored features include an open-air theatre and several temples, plus the Roman Museum, which features an authentic Roman house among its exhibits.

You can visit Switzerland any time throughout the year. Summer lasts roughly from June to September and offers the most pleasant climate for outdoor pursuits. Unfortunately, you won’t be the only tourist during this period, so prices can be high, accommodation hard to find and the mainstream sights crowded. You’ll find much better deals and fewer crowds in the shoulder seasons of April-May and late-September-October.

At any time, as you travel around the country you’ll hit many different climatic conditions. The continental climate in the Alps tends to show the greatest extremes between summer and winter. Mid-August to late October generally has fairly settled weather, and is a good period for hiking trips.

If you’re keen on winter sports, resorts in the Alps begin operating in early December, move into full swing around Christmas, and close down when the snow begins to melt in April.

The city of Berne or Bern (German: Bern (help·info) [b̥ɛrn], French: Berne [bɛʀn], Italian: Berna [ˈbɛrna], Romansh: Berna [ˈbɛrnə], Bernese German: Bärn [b̥æːrn]), is the Bundesstadt (federal city, de facto capital) of Switzerland and, with 128,041 people (agglomeration: 344,000), is the fourth most populous city in Switzerland (after Zürich, Geneva and Basel).

Most of Berne’s residents speak German, or more specifically, Bernese German, which is a high-Alemannic dialect. The Canton of Berne has a French-speaking part. Very few people still speak the Mattenenglisch, a language game used in the former workers’ quarter of Matte, but several words have found their way into Bernese German.

Berne also functions as the capital of the Canton of Berne, the second most populous of Switzerland’s cantons.

Illustrious Bernese include the reformer Albrecht von Haller, the poet Albert Bitzius and the painters Hans Fries, Ferdinand Hodler and Paul Klee. The German-born physicist Albert Einstein worked out his theory of relativity while employed as a clerk at the Berne patent office. A culturally important person was Mani Matter, a songwriter performing in Bernese German.

Switzerland (German: Schweiz, French: Suisse, Italian: Svizzera, Romansh: Svizra), officially the Swiss Confederation (Confoederatio Helvetica in Latin, hence its ISO country codes CH and CHE), is a landlocked country of roughly 7.5 million people in Western Europe with an area of 41,285 km². Switzerland is a federal republic consisting of 26 states called cantons. Berne is the seat of the federation and de facto capital,^[5] while the country’s economic centres are its two global cities, Geneva and especially Zürich. Switzerland is one of the richest countries in the world.

Switzerland is bordered by Germany, France, Italy, Austria and Liechtenstein. Switzerland is multilingual and has four national languages: German, French, Italian and Romansh. Switzerland has a long history of neutrality – it has not been at war since 1815 – and hosts many international organizations, including the Red Cross, the World Trade Organization and one of the U.N.’s two European offices.

The Latin formal name of Switzerland, Confoederatio Helvetica is derived from the Helvetii, an ancient Celtic people in the Alpine region. It is rendered in German as Schweizerische Eidgenossenschaft, in French as Confédération suisse, in Italian as Confederazione Svizzera and in Romansh as Confederaziun svizra. The establishment of Switzerland is traditionally dated to August 1, 1291; the first of August is the national holiday.