Quaint Towns in Jura Switzerland

Have you heard of the Jura region of Switzerland? It’s less known than some of the other Switzerland tourists spots, but it is not to be overlooked! Last month in February 2022, I set out on a long weekend trip to visit some quaint towns in Jura Switzerland. We did some nice hikes along rivers and through fields and forests. I want to share my adventure with you!

Funny enough, the way I discovered one of these towns was from a collaboration post I recently contributed to. For a fellow blogger’s post about 18 Enchanting Villages In Switzerland You Have To See To Believe, I submitted my input on the town of Flims. After the post was published, I was interested to read about the other submissions in this post. This is how I discovered the town called St. Ursanne in the western Jura region of the country.

I researched other towns in the area to visit and made our itinerary. I found a small nice Inn to stay the two nights in a town called Porrentruy. It was close to St. Ursanne and the pictures of the local castle enticed me to spend some time here.

Delemont

On the way over, we stopped off briefly in the village of Delemont. I fell in love with the look of this town too!

Porrentruy

Upon arrival to Porrentruy, we set off by foot to explore the castle just down the street. Only part of this 13th century castle remains, but you can walk through some of the rooms and up the spiral steps to the top of the Réfous Tower. As the castle sits above the town, you get a nice view of the surrounding area.

We walked all over the small town before having a delicious dinner in our auberge restaurant.

Saint Ursanne

Day 2 agenda was to drive 30 minutes from Porrentruy to the smaller village of St. Ursanne. The town’s name is said to be derived from a 7th century Irish monk, Ursicinus, who built a monastery here and lived as a hermit in isolation.

I had looked up some hikes to do in the hills and countryside around the town. We spent most of the sunny mild day walking through forests and fields with our cocker spaniel.

The village was cute and colorful. We took lots of pictures at the Doubs Bridge which was built in 1728.

We walked around town and visited the monastery with cloister and the Romanesque-Gothic church, dating from the 12th century.

We started our hike after visiting the village. At the highest point we had a nice 180 degree view of the town and area.

I found the most fascinating part of St. Ursanne to be the huge viaduct train bridge at one end of the town. We were lucky enough to see the train pass and get pictures of it.

After an enjoyable two days visiting these Jura region towns, we drove back home for 2.5 hours. We took a different route back which passed through the hillsides of Jura.

It was a fun weekend getaway to see another part of Switzerland that I hadn’t discovered yet. I highly recommend visiting this lesser-known region to see the quaint towns in Jura Switzerland!

If you are looking for assistance to plan your next trip, I am here for YOU! I love to plan travel itineraries for myself and others. For more details on how I provide this service, please check out my Itinerary Planning page and drop me a quick email at jan@janadventures.com to get started!