"The Swiss managed to build a lovely country around their hotels," wrote the humorist George Mikes. But, as you know, there's quite a bit more to Switzerland than wonderful hostelries. A very short list: mountain roads winding to sweet villages; surprisingly stylish cities; the archetypal Alps. As Thackeray wrote with British understatement, "It is good to be in the presence of this noble nature."

• TOTAL AREA: 41,290 sq km

• LAND AREA: 39,770 sq km

• WATER AREA: 1,520 sq km

• POPULATION: 7,523,934

• RELIGIONS: Roman Catholic 41.8%, Protestant 35.3%, Orthodox 1.8%, other Christian 0.4%, Muslim 4.3%, other 1%, unspecified 4.3%, none 11.1%

• LANGUAGES: German (official) 63.7%, French (official) 20.4%, Italian (official) 6.5%, Serbo-Croatian 1.5%, Albanian 1.3%, Portuguese 1.2%, Spanish 1.1%, English 1%, Romansch 0.5%, other 2.8%

• GOVERNMENT TYPE: formally a confederation, but similar in structure to a federal republic

• CAPITAL CITY: Bern

• OFFICIAL CURRENCY: Swiss franc (CHF)

• TIME ZONE: GMT/UTC +1