Sea to Shining Sea

So we woke up in Bern, Switzerland and came up with a plan for how we would spend our day.  We started out with free espresso and tea and then walked over to a market to get some breakfast.  One of the downsides of our hotel is that while there are free drinks, there is not free breakfast.  So we found fruit and pastries and even got two free Swiss chocolate bars on our way out (in honor of Black Friday, which many of the stores participate in).

After, we headed up to see the Bern Bear Park.  It was only a short walk from our hotel, and a very scenic one to enjoy.

When we arrived, we learned that the bears were all snug and warm and hiding, and un-viewable to tourists.  For the record, I didn’t blame them at all since it was a pretty chilly morning.

We did walk around the park a bit and also checked out the original Bear Pit.  Thankfully, the bears have a much larger and more natural space to roam these days.

The Bear Park did have the most spectacular views of Bern which we fully appreciated before walking to the train station.

At the station and after some research, we decided to take a train to Interlaken, a beautiful Swiss town nestled in the Swiss Alps between two lakes (hence it’s name… and hence my blog post title 🙂 ).  When we arrived, it was pretty cold.  But the views of the Alps were outstanding and we were definitely glad that we made the trip.

While walking around and taking in the sites, we stumbled upon a free Wildlife Park.  I joked with Jeremy that technically, we could say that we climbed the Swiss Alps since we had to hike up the mountain to check out this guy.  He was the highlight of the Wildlife Park and posed impressively for a few pictures.

Looking down from his enclosure, he had quite the views of Interlaken.

On a side note, Jeremy is not a fan of selfies.  And my poor iPhone is pretty bad at taking them.  But thankfully we do get a few in and each one makes me so happy since it captures memories of the man that I love most and the adventures that we get to share together.

After hiking down the mountain, we took a nice walk throughout the town of Interlaken. There were many beautiful sites to see along the way.

When we reached the west end of the town, we found a cute Cafe to sit in and enjoyed a bit of lunch.  We both had this delicious slice of quiche and shared a wrapped sausage as well.  The name of the Cafe was Michel and it instantly made me think of our Michael Einfeldt.  His mom posted a picture of him on Facebook and we are all praying that he will be able to come home soon.

We really enjoyed sitting and talking and taking in this view over lunch.  Though our vacation is coming to an end, I continue to be so very thankful knowing what a blessing it was that we were able to take this trip together.

The rest of the day consisted of walking, shopping and appreciating the beauty that was all around us.

Should you ever happen to find yourselves in Switzerland, Interlaken is definitely a fun place to visit.

We took a late train home and arrived back safe and sound.  We picked up some fruit, bread and cheese to take back to our hotel and enjoyed a nice dinner while winding down from our day.  We have one more day left to enjoy Switzerland before heading back to Milan and we look forward to tomorrow’s adventures.