Bern region
Six kilometres of covered walkways, two alpine lakes, and a mountain wall that rises to 3,454 metres.
The canton of Bern spans an unlikely range. In the north: the old city, a UNESCO World Heritage Site built on a narrow loop of the Aare, its six kilometres of covered walkways laid down by medieval guilds and still in daily use. A clock tower from 1530. Sandstone facades. The river below, impossibly green.
Destinations in Bern region
Slow travel in Bern region
South of the city the land opens. Thun sits at the point where the Aare leaves its first lake and the Alps begin to take shape in the distance. Spiez occupies its own quiet bay on Lake Thun, the castle above the water visible from the train. Interlaken sits between two lakes — Thun and Brienz, one blue, one emerald — where the valleys fork south toward different worlds. The Lauterbrunnen Valley runs 12 kilometres between walls 300 metres high and collects 72 waterfalls. Grindelwald sits at the foot of the Eiger's north face. The railway to Jungfraujoch, built in 1912 through tunnels carved directly into the mountain, still reaches 3,454 metres. Kandersteg, Adelboden, Gstaad: each valley quieter than the last. To the west, the Emmental folds into a different Switzerland entirely. Farmhouses, cheese cellars, covered wooden bridges, rolling hills with no dramatic endpoint in view. The GoldenPass rail line passes through it all, from Interlaken to Gstaad to Zweisimmen and onward. The Aare connects it. It begins in the glaciers of the Oberland, passes through Thun and Bern, and continues north. Following it, even partially, even slowly, gives the region a logic that no map quite captures.