Lauterbrunnen · Valley floor
The valley floor is the smart base: the station, the shops and the trailheads are all here. Below is where we'd stay across the valley, our own Chalet Staubbach a short walk from the centre (with a private wood-fired hot tub in The Apartment), plus the local hosts and villages we happily send guests to.
The Lauterbrunnen valley gives you two kinds of base. On the valley floor, Lauterbrunnen village itself, you get the railway station, shops, restaurants, a winter ski shuttle and direct access to both the hiking trails and the lifts up to Wengen and Mürren. It's the most practical and the best value. Up the mountain, in car-free Wengen or Mürren, you're closer to the snow but pay a premium, carry your bags up by train or cable car, and have far fewer beds to choose from, which is why those villages sell out a year ahead around big events like the Lauberhorn.
For most visitors, skiers and hikers alike, staying on the valley floor and riding up each day is the easier, cheaper and more flexible choice. You're never more than a short, scenic railway journey from the action, and you come home each evening to a quiet valley rather than a busy resort.
Full disclosure: we run one of the places on this page. Chalet Staubbach sits at the foot of the Staubbach Falls, a ten-minute walk from the village centre and station (and right by the ski-shuttle stop in winter). It's an apartment and two studios, each self-catering. The Apartment, the premium of the three, has its own private wood-fired hot tub with a view of the waterfall, the thing guests remember most after a day on the slopes or the trails, and is a Top 1% home on Airbnb. It's the one we know best, but it isn't the only good base in the valley, so further down we've listed the other valley-floor apartments and the Wengen and Mürren hosts we'd send you to just as readily.
My grandparents found Lauterbrunnen by accident. They were travelling up through Italy on their honeymoon in the 1950s, came over into the valley, and stopped. They stayed at the Staubbach Hotel, which is still there today.
They brought me for the first time in 1984. What I remember is the mountains, and the river thundering down through the valley. I kept coming back, on and off, for the next thirty years.
A little over ten years ago I left the UK to study in France, and from France I moved here properly. I live in the valley with my wife and our son, who was born here. We hike, we ski, we paddleboard on the lake in summer. Winter is our favourite season, which makes us unusual among visitors and ordinary among locals.
I run Chalet Staubbach and I write this guide. My day job is consulting, which I do from home, so I am here on ordinary Tuesdays in November, not only in high season. I see what the weather actually does, which trails open when, and what the village is like when nobody is in it.
That is the whole qualification. I am not a travel writer who came for a week.
Pick the size that suits, all three share the same prime valley-floor address. The Apartment has the private hot tub; the Studio suits longer stays; the Nest is the budget option.
Nightly ranges for our own three places, before cleaning. What you actually pay moves with the dates, the length of stay and how far ahead you book, so treat these as the shape of it rather than a quote. Dollar figures are converted at 1 USD = 0.835 CHF, set 15 October 2026.
Two more apartments we rate down in Lauterbrunnen itself, in the same traditional-chalet style as ours. Chalet Elza sits in a quiet, leafy spot by the river, about ten minutes from the village centre, hosted by Patricia and Dave. Each apartment has its own entrance and a full kitchen, and they share a garden, barbecues and a sauna, with free parking on site.
Seven places we know and trust up in Wengen, the car-free village on the sunny terrace above Lauterbrunnen, all from long-established local hosts and all a short walk from the station and the pistes. The two Talblick apartments share a traditional 1930s chalet, Monica's is a cosy hideaway for two, and the four Wengen Rentals apartments sit within a minute's walk of each other, handy for groups of up to 10 splitting across units.
A ten-minute walk from the centre, steps from the trailheads, and (in The Apartment) a private hot tub waiting when you get back.
What’s open, what’s shut, what the weather and the trains are up to, and which weeks are quiet. One email, first of the month, written here.
One email a month. Unsubscribe in one click. We never pass your address on.