Location-based Expense Reports – Aplins in the Alps

Looking to visit Zermatt without blowing your budget? By the end of this blog, you’ll know exactly how much we spent during one jam-packed week in Zermatt, Switzerland — eating, hiking, sightseeing, and even enjoying a little bit of luxury. Our hope is that these numbers can help you plan your vacation to Zermatt, whether you have just one day, three days, a week, or even longer. Free Download of EXACTLY what we spent in Zermatt! Snag our FREE download to see exactly what we spent — down to the last penny! In addition to how much it costs to visit Zermatt, this 8-page PDF includes the name of each hotel we stayed in, exactly which restaurants we visited, what we ate there, and all of our sightseeing excursions. We’re Jana and Brett, and we love helping you maximize your budget so you can travel Switzerland with confidence. That's why we tracked every expense during our week in Zermatt. We’ve broken down our Zermatt spending into four categories: Lodging Food Transportation Sightseeing But before we jump in, keep in mind that we booked this as a VERY last minute trip just one week before we went in August 2023. So if you plan farther in advance, you can hopefully save a lot more money than we did! So. let’s start with the cost of our lodging. Want to Watch instead of Read? https://youtu.be/-bA2pbv2cl8 LODGING (Zermatt Hotels) We’ve learned that the travelers watching our videos prefer a wide variety of lodging options. Maybe you’re just looking for a cozy, comfy, basic home base you can use to explore Zermatt…or maybe you wanna soak in a luxurious spa while enjoying Matterhorn views?! So to see what it might cost for each of these styles of accommodation, we booked 3 different hotels in Zermatt: one night in a 5-star hotel, two nights in a 4-star hotel, and four nights in a 3-star hotel, all in the heart of Zermatt village. And these hotels accounted for 54% of the total cost of our trip. 5-Star Hotel in Zermatt Our 5-star experience was over-the-top incredible from start to finish. We were transported from the train station to the hotel by horse-drawn carriage — horse-drawn carriage, y’all! (It was actually a little bit embarrassing!) We basically weren’t allowed to touch our luggage at all. It was picked up before we boarded our carriage and was waiting in our room once we checked in. The room itself was fantastic, of course, and our stay included free access to the indoor and outdoor pool, hot tubs, and wellness area with saunas, steam rooms, plunge pools, and heated relaxation chairs. One night of 5-star service and accommodation cost us 343 CHF. 4-Star Hotel in Zermatt And they even drove us by e-taxi to our next hotel, a 4-star spot where we spent the next two nights. And honestly, this might have been the best value of all three hotels in Zermatt. The front desk employees were so attentive and friendly — maybe the best staff of any hotel we’ve ever stayed in anywhere! (I know that's a bold statement, but it's true!) And because this hotel is partnered with the 5-star property we stayed in the night before, we continued to enjoy complimentary access to the spa and wellness area! The nightly rate for this hotel came out to 207.50 CHF. 3-Star Hotel in Zermatt Finally, we capped our stay in Zermatt with four nights at a 3-star hotel that’s been owned and run by the same family for 120 years. We had to walk to this one — oh the thought! — and it wasn’t quite as centrally located as the other two. But we loved our private balcony, and full access to the large garden area on the side of the hotel. And the nightly rate came to 183 CHF. A Note about Zermatt Airbnbs We personally prefer to book an Airbnb when we stay in a place for 3 days or longer, but since this was a last-minute trip, most of the options left were more expensive than our hotels turned out to be. And since we planned to eat out for one meal per day and our hotels included free breakfast, the value of having a kitchen just wasn’t as important as it usually is for us. The Cost of 7 Nights at 3 Hotels in Zermatt So altogether, our total lodging cost (with tourist tax included), came out to 1490 CHF, which is a nightly rate of 213 CHF (NOTE: the exchange rate was 1 CHF = $1.15 at the time of our trip). And if you’re wondering, all three of these Zermatt hotels were fantastic, and we’d stay in every one of them again. But, to be transparent, these numbers include a 25-30% discount at each hotel thanks to a sweet membership program that you might be able to benefit from! So be sure to check that out after finishing this post. Wanna See Our Zermatt Travel Expenses? Don't forget! You can download a free and detailed list of all of our spending in Zermatt — including: The name of each hotel we stayed in Exactly which restaurants we visited and what we ate there All of our sightseeing excursions And the exact costs for all of these…down to the penny because Brett leaves no penny behind when it comes to tracking our expenses. Plus, when we plan our vacations, this is the kind of information we look for, so we wanted to make it crystal clear and super easy for you to see those numbers. Download the 8-page freebie below. FOOD (Zermatt Restaurants) While we often save money by cooking most of our meals when we travel, we decided to approach this trip a little differently. Our main goal was to travel and spend money the way most visitors to Zermatt, like you, will. And according to a YouTube community poll we published earlier this year, that meant eating out at least once per day. So we did the very hard work of sampling quite a few different foodie spots — all in the name of research, of course! — and we’ve broken down our food spending into restaurants, cafes and bakeries, and groceries. This accounted for 27% of our total travel expenses, to be exact! Zermatt Restaurants Spoiler alert: the restaurants in Zermatt are incredible! And that’s not just limited to Zermatt village itself (definitely more info on that in future videos and posts). We ate out for dinner twice, and lunch 5 times, for an average of one meal per day. And sometimes we split our meal over two different spots — like appetizers at one place and an entree at another spot — in order to sample more restaurants, because...why not?! Now we rarely eat a whole lot at once, so our portion sizes were probably smaller than most people’s. But we also stopped a few extra times for drinks, desserts, or coffees in addition to our meals. So on average, you could think of it this way: We basically ate out one meal per day We both enjoyed one drink per meal (and 75% of the time that was a beer, wine, or cocktail) We averaged one shared dessert per meal Plus sometimes a coffee or tea And our total cost of eating and drinking in restaurants came to 580 CHF, or an average of about 82.75 CHF per day which equals about 41 CHF per person. Zermatt Cafes & Bakeries But you know it didn’t end there! It’s Brett's sworn duty to scope out the very best cafes and bakeries so you coffee snobs (like him!) won’t have to endure mediocre coffee. So in addition to our restaurant experiences, he also tried a cappuccino at 3 different cafes (where Jana sometimes drank tea as well), and we enjoyed cakes or pastries at four village bakeries. Our total spending at cafes and bakeries in Zermatt came out to about 63 CHF, or 9 CHF per day. Groceries in Zermatt And finally, since we enjoyed complimentary breakfast in our hotels and ate out once per day, that meant we shopped at grocery stores for the rest of our food needs, including snacks and drinks for our hikes. There’s nothing fancy to share here, except that we ate out at weird times and hiked so much that we weren’t always hungry for a full meal when we finally bought food at the grocery store. But we still spent 93 CHF over the course of the week. Total Cost of Food and Restaurants in Zermatt In total, our food costs came out to 736 CHF, or about 105 CHF per day or 52.50 CHF per person per day. Of course no two travelers or couples eat exactly the same, but if this is helping you to get an estimate of what you might spend when you visit Zermatt, download our free PDF so we know you value this type of content! ZERMATT TRANSPORTATION (Trains & Cable Cars) While we have no doubt you could have an amazing time soaking in your hotel hot tub or filling up on the local eats, most people come to Zermatt for more than that — and riding the Gornergrat railway or Matterhorn cable car high up into the mountains will be another major expense. Since the cost of getting to and from Zermatt, Switzerland will vary greatly depending on where you’re coming from, we decided to only include in this budget our transportation costs once we were already in Zermatt — and these accounted for 13% of our total spending. So what’s included? We visited each of the 3 major mountain peaks We went back to two different spots a second time for additional hikes And we even upgraded two of our rides for special experiences In total, we rode way up into the mountains on 5 of our 7 days in Zermatt, and hiked more than 50 miles over the course of the week! And our total costs for riding the transportation came to 377 CHF or about 54 CHF per day for the two of us. One important note is that we both already have Swiss Half Fare Cards, which allowed us to enjoy a 50% reduction on all our tickets. Otherwise, this all would have cost 727 CHF for the two of us with no Half Fare cards. So add another 120 CHF per traveler if you’re planning to visit Zermatt and want Half Fare Cards too. Learn more about the Half Fare Card in our Ultimate Guide to Swiss Train Passes (and free download to save you money by picking the best Swiss Train Pass)! There’s one more category to talk about. But before we do, we want to remind you that you can download a list of all of our expenses from our entire week in Zermatt, including each hotel we stayed in, the name of every restaurant, cafe or bakery we visited — along with everything we ate or drank — the exact trains and cable cars we rode, and of course, the extra little adventures we paid for. SIGHTSEEING (Things To Do in Zermatt) Speaking of those extras, here’s what we spent on sightseeing and entertainment, which accounted for just 6% of our total trip costs. Now the stunning scenery and wicked cool train and cable car rides are really all the entertainment you need. But, we still: Sped down the mountain a couple of times on mountain carts or scooters Visited a museum And checked out a nearby gorge And the total for all of that was 168 CHF. Grand Total For 1 Week in Zermatt, Switzerland Which means the GRAND TOTAL for the two of us for 1 week in Zermatt came out to 2770.70 CHF, or 395 CHF per day. BUT WAIT! Because you can likely do much better than we did — if you check out this blog for even more tips to travel Switzerland on a budget, including that hotel membership we mentioned earlier! We’ve packed that article with actionable ways that you can easily save more than 1000 CHF on your next trip, whether you’re visiting Zermatt or somewhere else in this beautiful country. So read that next, and we’ll see you in Switzerland!