A family trip through Tyrol and Lake Garda

When our son was nine, we spent two and a half weeks coming home overland from a year in Beijing through Russia, the Nordic countries, and western Europe, and it taught us that in traveling, it's better not to try to cram too many places in. A slow travel vacation feels that much more enjoyable if you're not moving on every day.

Call us cynical, but now that he was seventeen, we were reluctant to leave our home to his ministrations (nor those of his assembled social network) for a week or more. We wanted to plan one last family vacation for myself, my husband, and our son as adulthood loomed for him in the near distance. I longed to go to Norway and indulge in wholesome fantasies of Scandinavian baking, mountains, water, and temperatures that suited my feeble northern European pallor. My husband wanted to head east to Prague and the Czech Republic, and our son had a hankering for Italy. Our (very successful) compromise was a scenic train trip through France, Switzerland, Austria , and Italy that provided extended time in the mountains and lakes I wanted, plus some time in the more urban spaces that my son and husband enjoy.

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Stefanie Herbert

Day 1: Kent to Paris

It was a sense of anticipation that navigated us all the way up to St. Pancras, onto the Eurostar and through northern France; arriving punctually in a warm July Paris a few hours later.

Once we'd dropped off our luggage at our neat little hotel near the Gare de Lyon, we let serendipity guide our feet through a tourist map of the city that had been temporarily transformed on the eve of the Paris Olympics. This meant wandering westward. We walked from the Place de la Bastille, savoring the shade of plane trees on traffic-free streets. Now and then our path was punctuated by little adrenaline spikes, as we darted across the paths of resolutely Lycra-clad cyclists engaged in early road race heats.

After steak frites and omelets at an open-air café table, we were drawn to and through the greenery and tranquility of the Jardin du Palais-Royal. Our evening as aspiring flâneurs finished with us heading up the escalators snaking up the exterior of the Pompidou Center, to enjoy the city fizzing out below us as dusk descended.

Merowyn Yu

Day 2: Paris to Seefeld

After a hotel breakfast of Gallically delicious cheeses, yogurt, eggs, bread and fruit we were soon watching the French countryside zip by from the upper deck of a TGV speeding its way to Zurich. On arrival at this striking Swiss station, we had a couple of hours to stow our bags in the luggage lockers and amble up through the Old Town to sit by the spangled teal waters of Lake Zurich and knock back some chilled drinks.

Merowyn Yu

From Zurich to Innsbruck, we wound higher and higher along the Aarlberg Railway into mountains awe-inspiring and continental in scale, dwarfing the unspooling thread of tracks engineered up and down inclines and along the banks of frigid Alpine lakes. Continuing on the local train from Innsbruck to Seefeld, as it clung to the mountainside and slid through stippled patches of pine forest, took us higher still. We tumbled off the train as night was gathering, grateful that our hotel was less than a hundred yards from Seefeld’s orderly little station and for the cooler nighttime temperatures of the mountain air.

Days 3 to 5: Seefeld im Tirol

After breakfasting handsomely each morning on the hotel’s made-to-order omelets, mountain herbal teas, fruit, speck, honeycomb, a dazzling selection of jam, and a basket of breads, rolls and pretzels whose contents I made it a personal mission to sample each one of, we spent our days walking the well-marked mountain trails that unfurled outward from the town through the forest.

One of these walks brought us to the Bodenalm Hut. There, in a scene that could not have been more astutely choreographed by the Austrian tourism board, in the depths of a green valley, we passed a herd of butter-hued cows, neck bells a-clanking, to sit in the shade of the over-reaching timbers of an alpine hut, ordering weizenbier and more herbal tea as a band of local brass musicians played oompah music in lederhosen.

Another day, we walked the easy circuit of Seefeld’s lake, the Wildsee. With our swimsuits packed in a bag, we paid the small entrance fee at Strandperle. There we settled on the grass in the sun and chanced the deliciously shivery temperatures of the alpine meltwater. Back at the hotel’s welcoming spa, our teenage gym enthusiast made good use of the free weights on offer, and we all took advantage of floating in the clean-feeling waters of the on-site indoor pool. Then we lay and took in the broad mountain views from the jacuzzi and its surrounding recliners.

Merowyn Yu

Day 6: Seefeld to Desenzano

Equipped with Austrian pastries from one of Seefeld’s bakeries, we embarked on our descent back to Innsbruck, feeling the temperature creep up as our altitude began to fall; changing trains once more in Innsbruck to set off through the spectacular Brenner Pass. By late afternoon, we had arrived in the languid heat of an Italian summer.

After a little rest from the journey, we stepped out of our hotel later that evening for a stroll through the small harbor town of Desenzano del Garda. We found ourselves eating pasta al fresco before, cup of hazelnut gelato in hand, exploring the winding backstreets to the sounds of the little breakers on the pebbles ringing Lake Garda.

Merowyn Yu

Days 7 to 10: Desenzano del Garda

Up early to beat the hottest parts of the day, we had breakfast each morning on the top floor of the hotel on a terrace that sat like the prow of a ship, launching into the glittering expanse of Lake Garda, disappearing into a distance flanked by haze-blue geology.

We spent two days hopping on and off the ferries, making the most of the cooler breezes as we set off across the water, to the little towns of Sirmione, Garda and Lazise. With a lightweight towel and my swimsuit stowed in my daypack, it was easy to take a dip in the mild waters of the lake to cool off at various points while out and about.

On arrival in Sirmione, we struck out first for Catullus’ Villa, strolling through the sounds of cicadas busking among the ancient stones and olive trees before the crowds reached it for the day. Our combined ticket got us into this, as well as the charming (but much busier), turquoise-encircled battlements of Sirmione’s fourteenth-century Castello Scaligero, and the sleepy but impressive Roman villa and museum spread across a site conveniently across the street from our Desenzano hotel.

On our final day in Desenzano, we joined Alessio from South Garda Bike tours for a four-hour bike tour into the surrounding countryside, which ended sweaty but with a sense of achievement, among the olive trees on an agriturismo that overlooked Lake Garda. There, we sat and ate our way through a basket of warm eggplant pasta, bread, salami, hard-boiled eggs, plum juice, watermelon and apricots.

Merowyn Yu

Day 11: Desenzano del Garda to Chambery

Bidding farewell to Lake Garda, we caught the train back to Turin and then took a bus twisting its way through the dramatic passes and tunnels northwest to the French town of Chambery. We arrived in time for a few hours of puttering haphazardly among the Savoyards, and relaxing for the evening in the pretty, pastel-shaded streets of the shuttered old town, after a hearty dinner at Restaurant Les Halles.

Merowyn Yu

Day 12: Chambery to Kent

There was a greater sense of zest in the air the next morning when we rose early on our final day to wander the spreading stalls of Chambery’s food market, covetously eyeing bright displays of fruit and vegetables, fat cheeses, reluctant chickens, ice-nestled fish, pods of vanilla, enticing bread and cakes, and jars of yogurt. It seemed unlikely that any of it would survive much of the long, warm journey home crammed into backpacks.

We consoled ourselves with a final, wonderful hotel breakfast before crossing the street to the station and catching the TGV back to Paris. It was one last opportunity to gaze out the windows at the changing landscape, read our books and reflect on an adventure that had taken us through France, Switzerland, Austria, Lichtenstein (briefly), Italy and back through France. I also made very sure there was time in Paris to fit in one last, very indulgent, chocolate éclair.

Take Merowyn's trip to Tyrol and Lake Garda, or check out our other trips to Italy and Austria.

Read our guide to stress-free train vacations with kids, or about six of the best scenic train rides in Europe.