Montreux, Switzerland city guide: What to do and where to stay

Mountains wearing white hats and an enormous lake suited in blue-green are the first things you see when arriving in Montreux. As the suburbs give way to well-dressed streets, the riviera-chic centre cascades down stairways past boulangeries and chocolatiers to the lakefront and a singsong view of the Alps that transfixes your eyes. Soon, you’re off walking a promenade, shaded in palm trees, towards a suite of over-the-top Belle Epoque-era hotels, or to begin your exploration of one of Switzerland’s most underrated – and understated – cities.

For starters, there’s jazz galore in cafes, bars and during summer at one of the world’s most prestigious music festivals. There is wine on tap, thanks to the town abutting the Unesco-worthy Lavaux terraces, a tightly knit matrix of refined vineyards to the north. There is the country’s most romantic castle, which looks out over the mirror-still lake. And there is a fist-pumping, four-octave soundtrack thanks to Queen and Freddie Mercury, who stayed and recorded dozens of their greatest hits in the town from the late 1970s until the frontman’s tragic death in the early 1990s.

This is not how you are used to travelling in the Alps. But like rock’s ultimate showman, Montreux is a free and flamboyant rhapsody – and a definite crowd-pleaser.

What to do

Drink world-class wine

Where there is space in Montreux, the landscape brims with steeply raked vineyards and groves. Wine is an obsession along the east end of Lake Geneva and, between the houses and buildings, every square metre is accounted for. It’s like a Snakes and Ladders board of trellises.

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Throughout the year, Swiss wines come to the fore – more expensive than those from France and Italy, admittedly, but infinitely more minimal impact. Autumn though, is when it’s easier to connect with the landscape around you. In particular, October is when local wineries swing open their cellar doors, encouraging visitors to sample as many glasses of plonk as possible.

For the ultimate intro to Lake Geneva’s viticulture – and some of the 252 varieties of grape grown in Switzerland – the Swiss Wine Trail is a series of 22 hiking and biking trails that unfold through the Lavaux Vineyard Terraces. This offers up 830 acres of scenic vines…