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Districts, Areas and Overview
This guide covers a tight loop in the north-east of Switzerland, so the where-to-stay question reduces to two real options: St. Gallen, the small university and Abbey town that's the cultural anchor of the region, or Appenzell, the painted-house village an hour into the hills. Both are small, both are walkable, both are an easy day's drive from each other. Pick based on whether you're more "morning coffee in a 14th-century square" or "morning coffee with cowbells in the background."
St. Gallen
St. Gallen is the cultural anchor of the region and the easier of the two bases for a short trip. You're a couple of minutes' walk from the Klosterhof and the Abbey Library, surrounded by a small but extremely photogenic old town with painted facades on basically every street, and ten minutes' walk from the train station with direct connections to Zurich and to Appenzell. Hotels range from boutique stays inside the old town to standard mid-range business hotels nearer the station. The trade-off is the usual Swiss-city one (prices climb fast and weekend rooms fill up quicker than you'd think for a town this size) but you're paying for a genuinely walkable city with the country's best UNESCO library on your doorstep. Worth it for most short visits.
Interactive district map available here.
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Appenzell
Appenzell is the painted-house village an hour south of St. Gallen, and the right call if you want quiet evenings, cowbells out the window in the morning, and a 30-minute jump on everyone else heading up to the Alpstein at sunrise. The whole village is the size of a city block, so wherever you stay you're a couple of minutes from Hauptgasse, the parish church, and the Landsgemeindeplatz. Options are mostly traditional Gasthof-style inns and a handful of small hotels, with rooms above old painted facades and breakfast served on a wooden terrace. Quieter than St. Gallen by a wide margin, slightly cheaper, and the dawn light on the painted houses is a real perk if you're up early. Less interesting if you want a city evening with restaurant choices, museums, and after-dark life.
Interactive district map available here.
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For a one or two night visit, St. Gallen is the easier base because it has more rooms, more food choices, and direct trains in. For a longer stay, splitting nights between St. Gallen and Appenzell gets you both halves of the trip without backtracking. Wasserauen and the Alpstein huts (Aescher, Berggasthaus Seealpsee) are also stayable if you wanna sleep on the cliff itself, but they book up months ahead and aren't really a default choice.
Published May 2026.
