House Of Boy and Girl: Days 12, 13 and 14

We spent Friday, Day 12, in Bern and Fribourg because it was clouded over here in Lauterbrunnen, so there was no point in exploring the mountains that day. We got a bit of a late start because we were trying to finish up some laundry that morning, but we eventually got out the door. We arrived in Bern just in time for lunch, so we parked the car, and found a bench in one of the covered shopping arcades on which to eat our picnic lunch of cured meats, Swiss cheeses, tomatoes, rolls, apples, and Gummy Bears. :)

After lunch, we continued down the arcade in the direction of the famous Bern Bear Pits, only to discover that the last bear had died a couple of months ago, and they wouldn't be putting new bears in the exhibit until their new pit, which is currently under construction, is finished later this year. I wasn't too disappointed, because I think making poor bears live in a concrete pit in the middle of the city is a bit sad anyway. After that, we wandered around the city a bit more, found some fountains, found the house where Einstein formulated his theory of special relativity, and found a wine shop to poke about in for a while. Then we swung by the clock tower and decided to end our visit to Bern in favor of moving down to Fribourg.

Our first stop in Fribourg was a scenic overlook spot high above the old city. We snapped a few pictures there and admired the view for a while. Then we meandered our way down through the old-old city, and on into the new-old city, where we stopped to get out and see the cathedral and walk the streets for a while before we decided it was too hot, and we were too tired, and we just wanted to get back to our apartment. I was still battling my cold that day, so I wasn't much in the mood for wandering around. We made it back to the apartment and went out for dinner to a hotel that was having a BBQ night. We had a pot of fondue and BBQ for dinner, and it was good.

Saturday was another cloudy day here in the valley, so we decided to drive to Gruyeres for the day. We took a very twisty and curvy road through a beautiful valley and over a mountain pass to get there. It was a fun drive in the new car. Our first stop once we arrived in Gruyere was at the cheese factory. We watched a demonstration of Gruyere AOC cheese making, then we went to the restaurant for more fondue and some rosti, a potato dish that the Swiss are quite fond of. For dessert, we moved over to the Cailler chocolate factory across town, where we watched funny old movies about chocolate, toured their museum to learn how they make their chocolates, and then consumed copious amounts of free samples.

After lunch and dessert, we went to Chateau Gruyeres up on top of the hill. We walked through the old town area on the city wall, then on in to the castle. They did a pretty neat multimedia presentation about the history of the castle, then we were set free to tour the building and the grounds on our own. It was one of the best castle museums we've ever been to. I wasn't expecting much from their website, but it turned out to be a really good place to visit. After we finished up at the Chateau, we drove back to our apartment in Lauterbrunnen for the night.

We finally had a perfectly clear day arrive on Sunday morning, so we hustled into gear and got ourselves over to the train station for the trip up to the Jungfraujoch, the "Top of Europe". We rode the train from Lauterbrunnen, to Wengen, to Kleine Scheidegg, and then we switched trains to continue the journey from Kleine Scheidegg to the Jungfraujoch station. The first leg of the trip was mostly over ground, and had spectacular views. It took about 30 minutes. The second leg of the trip was almost entirely in underground tunnels and it took about an hour. We eventually arrived at a very cold underground station in the top of the mountain. We climbed out a tunnel and went up an elevator to a lookout point, where we were pleased to see that it was still sunny outside and we could see the glacier below us and the mountains all around. We walked out on the glacier for some fun in the snow before going back inside for lunch in one of the restaurants. After lunch, we walked through the ice cave, which is a little ice sculpture museum that they've carved out of the glacier. It was pretty fun. Then we got back on the train for the ride down the mountain.

We stopped our train trip at Kleine Scheidegg on the way down, and got out to take a hike across the mountain terrain. We hiked from Kleine Scheidegg to Mannlichen. It was a beautiful trail. We started out with views of the valley where Grindelwald is located, and eventually made it up to a ridge where we could see the valley where Lauterbrunnen is located as well. The clouds started to move in during the hike, but we were still able to take in some amazing views while we walked. We took the cable car from Mannlichen down to Wengen, then got back on the train for the rest of the ride back to Lauterbrunnen.