From Zurich I made my way to Bern. I had intially planned to take the Luzern-Interluken route but since I had already done this the day before, it was just a one hour trip. I arrived in Bern at about midday to find my next host, Regula wandering around the station looking for me just as I was doing for her. Lucky for me that we found each other at that time, as my train was late and she was about to leave.
In an old house near the train staion which usually had a bar, cafe, womens area, theatre and holds frequent parties, a once a month flea market was being held. Here you could by almost everything you could think of from scooters and bikes to console games, candlesticks and tea. I had to hold myself back as I saw so much stuff that I would have liked to buy but unfortunately can’t carry around with me. We spent a few hours looking around the markets and then decided to head back to her place.
Crazy bicycle for sale
Regula lived in a very old house which was situated inside an industrial area in a town about half an hour out of Bern called Oberburg. This industrial area has a building right next to the house which begins some sort of extreme hammering each morning at seven o’clock which shakes the entire house, continuing until five in the evening. Asides from Regula living there, there was also Nicole and Dino, a suitably hippy couple, another girl whoes name I never found out, and one more guy and another couple who were away at the time. For me this was great as I was given my own room which included its own fireplace to keep me toasty warm in the freezing nights. That night Regula, Nicole, Dino and I just hung out, ate some amazing food cooked by Nicole (who should be a chef), and listened to music. I spent half the evening dashing up and down the stairs to keep my little fire going.
The old house
The next day I was to meet up with a girl called Flurina who has contacted me the previous night on CouchSurfing, asking if I’d like to be shown around Bern. So at around midday, I met her in the Bern station and we set out on our mission. The first place to visit was the house where I had been at the flea market the previous day. I had wanted to get a betting picture of it.
Flea market location
Next we wandered down to one of Bern’s many bridges. Following this we made our way to the highest tower in Bern at the XXXXXXX church. It was many more stairs that I had predicted and after we fought our way up with a number of stops, we found the the view was totally worth it. Unfortunately over half of the tower was closed to it was next to impossible to get a decent view from the other side.
View from tower
After we headed back down, Flurina suggested that next on the agenda should be “bears and fountains”, so we went for a walk towards the Bern bears. For some reason or another, there is a pit in the middle of the city which for numerous years has held a number of bears. It’s a horrible concrete pit and many people oppose it. The bears look so sad in there, just sitting around waiting for food and most probably wishing that the winter would become cold enough to hibernate.
Bern's Bear
Next were the fountains. Not as amazing as many of the other fountains which I have seen on this trip, but pretty cool as a number of them (which run up the middle of the main pedestrian streets) are statues of folktales. The one which is the best and I think every one agrees with is this one of a man eating small (bad mannered) children – a tale parents would often tell to their kids to keep them in line!
Child eater!
A walk down the riverside followed lunch, and when we were about ten minutes down stream (which was 6.66 degrees by the way!) I spotted the zoo on the otherside of the river which Flurina seemed to think was free. So back we headed and over a bridge which we had passed. Then we just walked in! Past some ponies and mules, fluffy rabbits and then… RACOOONS! My god I just keep having child-like exciting moments! So mischevious looking and so cute at the same time.
Racooooooon :)
Onward we walked up the hill to find a pond full of pink flamingos. I find these birds hilarious, especially the way the walk around in the water. They would move around to find the sun in flocks, flapping their wings to gain all the sun they could get.
Flamingos
Our trip to the zoo was our last activity for the day, and as the sun was setting we headed back to the train station where I thanked Flurina for showing me around and then set off back to Oberburg for another evening of music and hanging out.
The following day Nicole had no work and so decided to come with me on a trip to Gruyères to visit the H.R. Giger museum. This is the guy who invented the alien from the film Alien. It was lucky that she came along as it involved 3 trains and a bus, plus numerous amounts of German and French speaking. On arrival we had about an hour to spare so we decided to have a look around Gruyères, a very quaint little medival town set on the edge of the Swiss Alps.
Gruyères
At 1pm the museum opened. This place was crazy, the mind of this man insane. There were so many amazing pictures of creatures that I could never dream of. Very dark and for some reason, also very erotic. They had this little “adults only” section which seemed pretty pointless as almost all of his work had some weird alien sexuality to it. Unfortunately you were not alowed to take photos inside, but this was on the outside:
Babies in a gun
And there was even a bar which he designed, indeed also crazy:
Giger bar
And soon it was time to make the long trek back to Oberburg. We were not back for long when Regula came in from work, covered in snow! “It’s snowing!” she called, and looking out the window, it definitely was. So after another beautiful dinner made by Nicole, she, Dino and I headed outside into the already 4-5″ snow to play around. Snow fights were not an option of choice, and I was amazed to find that you actaully can roll snow into huge balls, resulting in by far the best snowman I have ever built.
Snowman!
This went on for a few hours and by then we were all tired and soaked and ready to sleep, but not after more music and hanging out, though!
I had initially planned to leave the following day, but it took me a while to find a place to stay so I spent one more day in Bern. This day I used for doing nothing. I headed into Bern to get a train ticket and then just spent the rest of the afternoon relaxing and watching the snow out the window. A quiet evening and my time in Bern was over, again going so fast!
The next morning I was off to Cannes!
