How an ebike gave me the legs to tackle Switzerland’s contours | Switzerland holidays

With relatively few cars and roads as smooth as a Federer serve, Switzerland seems engineered for a low-carbon cycling holiday. Indeed, the Swiss government has launched a number of new cycle routes in recent years – including cycle route 1291.

Named after Switzerland’s founding year, route 1291 wraps around the heart of old Switzerland: the three founding cantons of Unterwalden (now Obwalden and Nidwalden), Uri, and Schwyz, as well as Lucerne. Starting and ending in the city of Lucerne, it runs through picturesque countryside for 240 miles. Sounds dreamy, but there’s just one problem: those mountains.

Thankfully, the invention of the electric bicycle means that more of us can strap on a metaphorical extra pair of quadriceps, divert our minds from the climb and on to the Alpine views. They’ve surged in popularity: almost half of all new bikes sold in Switzerland are now ebikes.

I’ve come to sample an 111-mile section of route 1291 (the Lucerne canton part). I start by catching a train from Lucerne to Schüpfheim, then the 241 bus to Sörenberg. There, I pick up my rental bike – a sturdy, touring-style ebike made for long distances and heavy loads – along with my guide, Céline Deplazes from Lucerne Tourism. We’ll be following an itinerary designed by Eurotrek, which is typically self-guided with luggage, thankfully, shuttled from one hotel to the next.

Céline tells me that Route 1291, which was launched in 2022, was created in part to tempt travellers away from the overcrowded city of Lucerne and into the wider region. This includes Entlebuch, a Unesco biosphere of moorlands and serrated peaks up to 1,910 metres that will be the focus of our first day’s cycling.

I get off to a rough start. The sky is spitting rain, and on the only offroad section of the entire trip – a downhill stretch of farming track just 2.5 miles long – my tyre skids, the mountains spin and I tumble on to the wet gravel, cutting my knee. As she helps to patch me up, Céline agrees that this section is probably better walked.

It’s the only bump; the rest of the way is paved with Swiss precision. I spend most of the ride with my bike in the low-powered “eco” mode, occasionally flipping to “standard” and once to “high” on a steep hill. There are charging stations at most restaurants we stop at, though I…