Lucerne

The Kapellbrücke, a covered timber footbridge built in the fourteenth century as part of the town's defences, angles across the Reuss beside the octagonal stone Water Tower, which has served as an archive, prison and treasury. Painted panels from the seventeenth century under the roof show scenes from Swiss and Lucerne history. A fire in 1993 destroyed much of the bridge and many of the paintings; it was rebuilt quickly, and the scorched panels that survived are still in place.

TipCome early in the morning or after dark, when the bridge is quieter and floodlit.

On the left bank of the Reuss, the twin onion-domed towers of the Jesuit Church mark one of the first large Baroque churches built in Switzerland, dating from the 1660s and 1670s. Inside, the white and pink stucco and the bright ceiling are a contrast to the dark wood of the bridges outside. It's free to enter, but remember that it's a working church.

A short walk downstream, the second covered bridge is smaller, quieter and in many ways more remarkable. Its roof panels form a seventeenth-century Dance of Death cycle by Kaspar Meglinger, in which a skeleton comes for people of every rank, from the pope to the farmer. Beside it, the needle dam that regulates the lake level still uses wooden needles set by hand.

On the right bank, a tight web of lanes links the Kornmarkt, with its Renaissance town hall and arcades where markets are still held, the Weinmarkt with its fountain, and the Hirschenplatz. Many of the guild houses and townhouses carry painted facades with coats of arms, allegories and scenes from local history. Wander without a plan; the whole area is pedestrianised.

Most of the town wall built along the hill above the Old Town in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries still stands, with nine towers. Several towers and parts of the wall walk are open to the public in season (from the beginning of April to the beginning of November), including the Männli, Schirmer and Zyt towers. The Zyt tower holds the oldest clock in Lucerne, whose dial was meant to be read from the lake, and by tradition it strikes the hour a minute before the other clocks in town.

TipThe walls are closed in winter, and the stairs are steep and narrow. Check museggmauer.ch for current hours.

A dying lion carved into a sandstone cliff above a small pond, designed by the Danish sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen and finished in 1821. It commemorates the Swiss Guards killed defending the Tuileries Palace in Paris in 1792, and the wounded animal, a spear in its side, sheltering a shield with the French lilies, is genuinely moving. Mark Twain called it the most mournful and moving piece of stone in the world. The Glacier Garden, with potholes ground into the rock by meltwater in the last ice age, is next door.

A short walk from the station, a former bank building holds the private collection of the art dealers Siegfried and Angela Rosengart. Its strengths are Pablo Picasso, with paintings, drawings and photographs of the artist by David Douglas Duncan, and a large group of works by Paul Klee, along with Impressionist and modern pieces by Monet, Cézanne, Matisse, Miró and others. It's a manageable size for an hour or two.

The Culture and Congress Centre, designed by Jean Nouvel, sits on the lakefront beside the station under a huge, thin flat roof that seems to float above the water. Its concert hall, admired for its acoustics, is the main stage for the Lucerne Festival. In front of it, boats of the Lake Lucerne Navigation Company leave for every corner of the lake, including five restored paddle steamers built between 1901 and 1928, the largest such fleet on any Swiss lake.

TipThe long trip to Flüelen, through the fjord-like Lake Uri, is the most dramatic sailing; check which departures are steamers in the timetable.

On the lake shore east of the centre, the Verkehrshaus is Switzerland's best-known museum, covering railways, roads, ships, aviation and space, with real locomotives, cable car cabins and aircraft, a planetarium and plenty for children to climb into. Allow at least half a day. It's a pleasant walk along the shore, or a short ride by bus, train or boat.

Known as the Queen of the Mountains, Rigi rises between Lake Lucerne and Lake Zug, and its summit at Rigi Kulm has views across the lakes to the Alps. Europe's first mountain railway opened here in 1871, climbing from Vitznau on the lake, and a second line comes up from Arth-Goldau; a cable car also links Weggis to Rigi Kaltbad. A classic loop is the steamer to Vitznau, the cogwheel railway up and the cable car down to Weggis. The slopes are good for gentle walking in summer and sledging in winter.

Above Schwyz, the Stoosbahn, opened in 2017, is the steepest funicular in the world, with a maximum gradient of 110 per cent; its round cabins tilt so passengers stay upright. At the top is the car-free village of Stoos. In summer, a chairlift and a short walk lead to the Klingenstock, from where a ridge trail runs to the Fronalpstock, with wide views over Lake Lucerne. The ridge walk is exposed in places and suits sure-footed hikers.

The Bürgenstock is a wooded ridge on a peninsula in the lake, reached by boat from Lucerne and a funicular from the pier at Kehrsiten. A cliffside path, the Felsenweg, leads round to the Hammetschwand Lift, an outdoor glass-and-steel elevator from 1905 that rises about 153 metres up the rock face to a summit viewpoint, the highest outdoor lift in Europe. The lift and path are seasonal and close in winter and bad weather.

Lucerne's own mountain, rising steeply to the south-west of the city. The Golden Round Trip combines a boat to Alpnachstad, the cogwheel railway up and the panorama gondolas and the Dragon Ride aerial cableway down to Kriens, with a bus back to town, or the same in reverse. The cogwheel railway, opened in 1889, is the steepest in the world, at up to 48 per cent, and runs only in the warmer months (in 2026 from 11 May to 29 November), so the full round trip is a May to October outing. The gondolas and cable car close for maintenance in late autumn (in 2026, 19 October to 27 November).

TipIn winter, Pilatus is reached only by the gondolas and cable car from Kriens.

South of the lake, the monastery village of Engelberg sits at the foot of Titlis, a 3,238-metre peak with glacier ice all year round. Cable cars climb in stages to the summit station, where you'll find the Cliff Walk suspension bridge over a sheer drop, a cave cut into the glacier and, in summer, the Ice Flyer chairlift over the crevasses and a snow park. The summit area is a building site until a new peak station opens, planned for 2029, and from mid-August to mid-December 2026 the revolving Rotair cabin is replaced by a non-rotating cable car.

TipEngelberg is about 45 minutes from Lucerne by train; take the first lifts for the best visibility.