SK80: Europe Part 5.3: Switzerland: Bern and the Emmental Valley

We arrived in Bern and quickly realized we should have gotten more solid directions on where to meet our good friend Mares. We felt pretty lost. Thank goodness we were eventually able to find her.

This is possibly the most unflattering picture ever... but it really captures how happy we were to see our friend!

A little background: Mares and my Mom met when my Mom was in high school and Mares was an exchange student for a family in my grandparent's ward. The two girls became instant friends for life. Mares, her husband, and their daughter Rahel have been to visit my family several times. It was great to finally get to visit them on their home turf.

This picture of the 'Bubenbergerplatz' sign is for Scott and his sister Kristi... they know why.

We left the train station and got right down to the business of sightseeing. Bern is gorgeous!

Mares showed us the famous Bärengraben (bear pit). This pit didn't have any bears in it because...

They just upgraded the bears to these swanky new digs. Mares said this place was years in the making and was just recently completed. Lucky bears.

Mares told us this is where the poor people of Bern used to live. It has since been gentrified and is now completely unaffordable.

A typical Bern street.

We loved the cobblestone streets and little slanted cellar-like doors. Mares told us the doors lead to different businesses, clubs, restaurants and theaters underground.

Yet another amazing Swiss fountain.

Mares told us the forked bar under the spout was designed for people to set their buckets on while they collected water. Clever Swiss.

The Church of St. Peter and St. Paul was closed to visitors when we passed by. At least we got to see the beautiful exterior.

I really liked this building (the Rathaus or Town Hall) with all of the Swiss canton flags along the top.

Mares is an amazing tour guide.

The Aar river is the most beautiful turquoise color and runs all around Bern.

More great Swiss murals.

Mares told me the Zytglogge Glockenspiel is my Mom's favorite part of Bern. I can see why!

It has a really cool astronomical clock dial

And the little figurines and bells go nuts every hour.

Back in the day these bars were used as the standard units of measurement for goods sold in Bern.

We stopped by Migros for a tasty lunch and ate it outside the Swiss capital

We made our way to the Munster of Bern, a stunning gothic cathedral in the old part of the city.

Mares told us the Munster's sandstone exterior is constantly going through some kind of renovation.

The archway over the Munster entrance has a really beautiful late-gothic depiction of the last judgement.

The details on each sculpture are amazing.

The interior is really beautiful

It's sadly really hard to get decent photos inside a cathedral.

Once again we found a little shrine to dentistry.

Awesome.

Mares told us families pay lots of money to reserve these seats. The more money you pay, the closer to the priest you get to sit. Each reserved seat has some sort of family crest inlaid in the seat back.

We decided to climb to the top of the tower to get a good view of the city.

We could have spent all day up there.

We loved being able to see the Eiger, Monch, and Jungfrau off in the distance. It was hard to believe we were right at the foot of those mountains earlier that day.

Another view of the river.

There are really detailed sculptures all along the top of the tower. Some of them are 'self portraits' of some of the architects and stonemasons who designed/built the cathedral.

Some of the ginormous church bells

Bern has an ingenious network of arcades to help people avoid walking in nasty weather. In 1902, Albert Einstein wrote to his fiance, saying, 'Both sides of the road are completely lined by old arcades so that one can stroll from one end of the city to the other in the worst downpour without getting noticeably wet.' He was delighted that the city of Bern had bested the weather. Speaking of Einstein, we didn't have time to tour his house... guess we'll have to go back to Bern!

Scotty is so strong!

We started making our way to Mares' house when she made a little detour to show us the Bern LDS temple. It was a really fun surprise.

The Bern mission home is right on the temple grounds.

The Burri family was so generous to make us a traditional raclette feast and let us stay at their house. It was so fun to see my friend Rahel (Mares' oldest daughter) and meet her youngest daughter Julia. We invited them to come stay with us when they come to the states next summer. I hope they take us up on our offer!

The next morning we woke up to a typical Swiss autumn fog.

Mares took us to Coop and Migros to buy chocolate while we waited for the fog to clear up.

Heaven!

We ended up buying about 20 lbs of chocolate. YES!

After the store, the fog had magically cleared! So, Mares drove us to a hill where we could get a good view of the Emmental valley. Note: some of my ancestors are from this neck of the woods. I'm not exactly sure which branch of the family tree sprouted here, but I think that's pretty great!

I don't think I've felt like part of me has been missing out on anything... however, being here felt like a sort of homecoming. It's hard to explain, but I felt 'plugged in' to this place. It made me want to visit all of the original locations of my ancestors.

I still can't figure out why my ancestors left this valley.
Honestly! Look at this place! Amazing!

It was really cool to once again see the Swiss Alps off in the distance.

We made our way down the hill through bushes and bushes of blackberries.

Yum!

Our next stop was the Emmentaler cheese factory.

Where we -of course- ate a ridiculous amount of cheese.

And then we ate more cheese.

As mentioned earlier, I REALLY want one of these giant cowbells for our house someday.

It was great to eat fresh made ice cream right next to the pasture with the cows who gave the milk for such a tasty treat.

I can't say enough how much we loved the sound of the bells around the cow's necks.

Right before leaving the cheese factory we got to see a demo of the old school way to make cheese.

This guy was amazing! Wish we could have stuck around to taste the results.

It was SO smokey in the little cheese house. Check out the thick layer of smoke residue on the cow bells. Speaking of cow bells, we made it our mission to find a REAL (AKA not touristy and overpriced) cow bell to take home with us before leaving Switzerland.

We drove around to a couple of places that would potentially have a bell to buy but didn't have any luck. We thought, 'Oh well. Maybe next trip'. As we only had a few hours left before our train to Paris, we tried to fit in a few more sights. Mares took us to check out a castle on a hill where peasants used to beg for food.

Then we walked around an adorable village.