Switzerland is well known for its micro climates. It can be pouring rain in one valley, while there are blue skies in the next valley over. So if it’s raining where you are, you can can often do a little research and find somewhere not too far away with better weather.
Swiss Weather Forecasts
We like two websites for Swiss weather: Search.ch and www.meteoswiss.admin.ch.
We particularly like the precipitation animations, which shows a map of Switzerland and where rain is predicted to fall. You can find it here: http://meteo.search.ch/prognosis. They also have a mobile app.
The regional descriptive forecast often notes at what elevation you can break out of the clouds, which you can match up to your desired destination and see if you are getting high enough. I also like the map section of this website that shows icons for important things like mountain transport, waterfalls, webcams right on the map.
Here’s an example of tomorrow’s forecast. At 10:40, it looks pretty menacing.
But at 14:00, the storm seems to be leaving most of Switzerland and Zurich might escape it alltogether.
It doesn’t always work. But many times, we’ve found the only sunny spot in Switzerland using this map and had a great day outside when most everyone else was stuck inside. We’ll see what happens for real tomorrow.
Webcams
We also like Swiss WebCams, which has “more than 1,300 webcams of Swiss landscapes.” We always check the webcam before we commit to a long drive and expensive gondola ride. We don’t want to be stuck in the clouds.
Rainy Days
If you can’t beat the weather, try our Rainy Day Guide, which includes indoor swimming, interactive museums, and indoor sport.
