6. Bern Old Town and Bern to Geneva 9/2/22

This will be short as it’s late and it’s been a long day. In brief, we started the day walking (once again) in the old center of Bern which is about as charming as it gets. It’s the medieval center and has retained all the character of the period. Bordered on three sides by the river it’s actually very compact. There was a fire in 1405 and much of the city had to be rebuilt. Because of all of the rivers you are constantly finding yourself crossing one bridge or another. The river is like a horseshoe as it wraps around Bern. It sometimes splits with little islands in the middle. It never seems to be wider than 200 ft. but is often only about 50’ wide. 

We stopped again at Einstein Café for a snack, and this time realized that the café is on the ground floor of the building where Einstein lived during the two years he worked on the theory of relativity. We made a quick stop in the cathedral and checked out whatever arcaded streets we hadn’t explored yesterday. One interesting feature of several of the Swiss cities that Mike especially liked is the fact that the cities have lots of red chairs scattered about plazas and shopping streets so that people can sit, rest, have an ice cream cone or whatever. Just overall, very humane values that are exposed in planning, design, and overall concern for the population.

Unfortunately one health issue hasn’t seemed to have hit the Swiss — they are still smoking! Yes, well- educated, well-employed Swiss of all ages are still smoking—something that truly amazes us.

After a quick lunch, we said goodbye to Bern and headed on the fast route to Geneva for the pre-wedding dinner. Our real purpose in coming to Switzerland this trip (especially since we had been here only four months ago) is to attend Mike’s niece Julia’s wedding. She and Julien have been together for about six years and have two children (and another on the way). Tonight’s event was a chance for the families to meet (although we had already met part of Julien’s family at various Christmases and other events.

But, I digress— the first hour of the drive from Bern goes through beautiful ag land, forests, and pastoral areas. The highway consists of scores of short tunnels on top of which there are animals grazing or parks or crops, or just grassy areas or trees. Where we in the states would probably blast through and create heavy retaining walls, they have preserved the landscape and ag land and only tunneled through. Strange to drive through a tunnel and see corn growing above.

After checking into our hotel – one we have stayed at many times before (but which suddenly seemed very worn and ill-equipped after our stays at such amazing hotels as the Bellevue Palace and des Balances), we quickly headed to the location for the pre-wedding dinner in the town of Carrouge (adjacent to the city lines of Geneva) and where Elizabeth (Mike’s sister-in-law) lives.

Tomorrow afternoon is the wedding – more after that.

Disappointed to learn on CNN that Trump is still a free guy and is likely to still be out in the public when we return on Thursday.

Best – Fern