A vast expanse of Narcissus flowers adorns the mountains and valleys of Switzerland in the Spring making it a great season to explore the country. The flowers are mainly found in the Swiss region of Vaud near the towns of Montreux and Vevey. They could be best experienced by hiking. You can drive up or take the mountain trains from these cities to the beginning of the trails.
There are in fact many hiking trails which are well designed for enjoying the beautiful Narcissus fields. Choosing on which trail to take could be a bit overwhelming. However, there are official sites from each region helping to decide the trail based on the current weather and blooming state of the flowers. A summary from those sites and our personal experiences are described in this article.
Each trail has a different blooming season which is dependent on their location, height and other factors. So as to enjoy this amazing phenomenon, chose the right trail depending on the week during which the hike is planned. The broad range is from the end of April to the beginning of June.
The main locations and the blooming periods are :
Near Montreux
Glion - Beginning to Mid May
Les Avants - Mid May
Vallon de Villars - Mid May
Caux - Mid May to End May
Near Vevey
Les Pléiades - Mid May to End May
Mont-Pèlerin - Mid May
Source: http://www.narcisses.ch/narcisse-floraison.php
We did the trail of Les Pléiades and Les Avants in the end of May 2020. We found that the blooming respected the forecast and we saw a lot of flowers in Les Pléiades and hardly any in Les Avants.
Resources
1. http://www.narcisses.ch/narcisse-floraison.php : The site, though only in french, is a wealth of information helping to plan different hikes. From the above page, you can download the hiking trails integrated into google maps. The maps also show markings where Narcissus fields could be found along the trail.
2. https://www.narcisses.com : This is the main site and has all the information that you would need in English also. The site also shows the current status of the flowers - if they are in bloom or already wilted.
Though the forecast was not in favour for the blooming season, we decided to try our luck in Avants only to discover later that the forecasts were indeed right. There were no flowers left. Nevertheless, the hike was really enjoyable and had some great viewpoints. We hiked up a small mountain and walked down a rather steep trail through a forest to a train station called Chamby and then took the train back to Montreux. We had spend around another 4 hours doing this hike.
Our experience
We were really confused as to which hike to take and wanted to see it all. So we did three of these trails in a day(!) though our original plan was to do just one. The most popular among the trails is the Les Pléiades trail and was obviously our first target. We took a train from Vevey to a station called Lally. We walked from Lally to Les Pléiades. We found the most blooms behind the train station of Les Pléiades. We took an early morning train to have the place all to ourselves. There was this bench in the middle of a flower field and was a perfect spot to enjoy our breakfast.
We then started the actual hiking path which starts in front of the train station following immediately a short uphill path. The hike is actually an easy one and we saw families with kids having a fun time. It is a loop trail and as you reach the turn of the loop, its a vast field covering an entire hilltop. It was again a perfect spot for a short break and absorb the beauty.
After that, the trail goes downhill throughout.The hike is estimated for 2 hours long and as always we took much more, around 4 hours, as we had many breaks and photo-stops. We reached the train station of Lally at the end and took the train back to Vevey.
We still had a half day left and decided to do the trail of Les Avants too. We then took another train to Montreux and then changed to the Golden Pass train from Montreux to Les Avants. We always wanted to take this famed train ride as it offers unparalleled views of Lake Leman and the rich look of this train is particularly attractive.
The sunsets above Lake Leman are legendary and we made an impromptu plan to go up to Caux, another place famous for Narcissus blooms. It was already around 8 PM and by the time we reached Caux, the sun had started to set. We didn't had much time to hike the full trail. So we went to a viewing platform very close to the train station and stood there admiring the perfect sunset over the lake.
Later we found some pictures on Instagram having a stunning view of the lake and narcissus flowers from Caux. So now we know where we are going in the next season!
Few more pics and videos : https://www.instagram.com/wetravelmiles/