Where to stay in Lucerne: the best areas and hotels

This is the Lucerne of the postcards. The Old Town sits on either bank of the River Reuss, a car-free knot of cobbled squares, frescoed guild houses and fountains, stitched together by the Chapel Bridge and its stout stone Water Tower. Behind it, the towers of the medieval Musegg Wall march along the hilltop.

Hotels here are small and full of history: old inns on the Weinmarkt, townhouses with terraces hanging over the river, rooms that look straight at the bridge and Pilatus beyond. The station, the boats and the Lion Monument are all a few minutes' walk. Light sleepers should note that the lanes stay lively in the evening, and that old buildings rarely mean big rooms.

Walk east from the Old Town along the lake and Lucerne turns grand. This is where the nineteenth-century tourists stayed, and their palace hotels are still here: long Belle Époque facades, chandeliered lobbies and terraces looking across the water to a horizon of snow.

It is the smartest address in town and priced accordingly, but you get what you pay for: lake-view rooms, spas, serious restaurants and the tree-lined promenade for a morning stroll. The Old Town is a stone's throw from the nearest hotels and around a 15-minute walk from the furthest, so you lose very little in convenience. Come here for an anniversary, or simply to feel like a visiting duchess.

Lucerne's station sits right on the lake, with the boat piers outside the door and the KKL culture and concert centre next to it. The Chapel Bridge is just across the water. If you are arriving by train with a suitcase, or planning day trips up the mountains, you will not find a handier base.

The streets behind the station, the New Town, are more everyday than the Old Town: shops, offices, good restaurants and a wide spread of hotels, from simple three-stars to design-led four-stars with rooftop bars. You trade a little romance for space, choice and keener prices, and the pretty bits are still only a five- or ten-minute walk away.

Weggis lies on a sheltered bend of Lake Lucerne beneath Mount Rigi, and has been soothing visitors for well over a century. Queen Victoria and Mark Twain both stayed on the neighbouring Hertenstein peninsula. The pace has barely picked up since: a waterfront promenade, a boat landing, and mountains reflected in the lake.

Hotels here are about the water and the spa. Expect outdoor pools and bathing lawns on the shore, saunas, gardens and restaurants that take their cooking seriously. It suits couples and anyone who wants a restful base with Lucerne as a day trip by boat. Skip it if you want nightlife, or to walk home from dinner in the city.

A little further along the shore from Weggis, Vitznau is smaller still: a pier, a church, a handful of hotels and the bottom station of the cog railway that has been hauling passengers up Mount Rigi since the nineteenth century. Lucerne is about 40 minutes away, or a leisurely hour by steamer.

The village punches well above its size for places to stay. A turreted five-star palace sits right on the water, there are lakeside spa hotels with their own jetties, and simple, friendly three-stars by the station for walkers heading uphill. Evenings are quiet to the point of silence, which is why people come.

Some of the region's most memorable hotels are not in Lucerne at all, but above it. The Bürgenstock resort perches on a ridge 500 metres over the lake, reached by boat and a funicular, with an Alpine spa and views that make people go quiet. Its sister hotel, built in local stone and timber, is tucked into the woods behind.

Higher still, a historic hotel sits on the very summit of Pilatus, and on the Rigi you can soak in a mineral bath while looking down on the clouds. These are places for a night or two of drama rather than a week of sightseeing: once the last cable car has gone, you and the stars have the mountain to yourselves.

Lucerne is not a cheap city, and the simplest way to bring the bill down is to sleep a few minutes outside it. Kriens, at the foot of Mount Pilatus, has modern chain hotels beside the suburban railway, which reaches the centre in about five minutes. The exhibition centre and the football stadium are close by, as is the motorway.

Further out, Emmen and Littau have straightforward business and family-run hotels with parking, which matters if you are touring Switzerland by car. Nobody would call these neighbourhoods pretty. But the rooms are new, the trains are frequent, and the money you save buys a lot of fondue.