Bern and Lucerne

23-24 September 2011 


Bern

We reached Bern, the capital city of Switzerland and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Few people are outside the quiet street and only buses and the trams are busy. We headed straight to the main city, all waiting for the clock to strike at 6:00pm. 

 Bern's famous clock tower, the Zytglogge (pronounced as tseet-klok-uh) is the famous and a must see for all tourist. I don't know exactly how many minutes that show lasted but things move slow through the top of the hour. There is a little display of a crowing cock, a parade of bears, a knight, a piper, a lion, Chronos with his hourglass and a dancing jester. After that, the crowd said in chorus "is that it?".  I don't understand well the meaning of each hand because our tour guide needs to translate it in  Chinese language, but of course it boils down to one thing I guess......the value for time. For better understanding, I searched the history of this historical tower clock  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zytglogge.

 We walked past the main street and headed at the back of the cathedral. We saw a small park with impressive views of the town. 

 Another place to visit on this city is the Einstein House. The famous physicist, Albert Einstein, lived in Bern between 1903 to 1905. The small flat he rented on the second level at Kramgasse No. 49 has been turned into a museum. According to our tour guide, it contains furniture of the Einstein family and pictures, texts and displays of Einstein's work. We also visit the bear pit's. Another laid back night, we drove the short distance back to the hotel, and then into our bed.

Lucerne

It is meant to be the most beautiful city in Switzerland and one of the most beautiful in Europe, according to some travel journals I have read before joining this tour. Its hard to imagine a cleaner, idyllic and picture post card scenery city than Lucerne.

 There is a certain moment when an urban landscape looks best. I didn't expect such a picture perfect view on a busy yet quiet city of Lucerne. We had a free half day to wander in the city.  I set my clock and jot down our meeting place.

The crown jewel of Lucerne is the wooden Chapel Bridge or Kapellbrucke. The exterior of the bridge were full of hanging edelweiss in different colors. I just could not stop taking photos that I started to feel my wrist and hand aches, imagine four days of non-stop photographs hahaha.

 The bridge house has many paintings on top  telling stories of patron saints and heroes of the city. There is an octagonal stone tower beside the bridge. It was used as a prison and it’s now the site of a souvenir shop and a treasury.

I had a close encounter with the swan, making the river lively as they swam near you when  the food was thrown at them.

After spending sometime in the Chapel Bridge, we walked further and grabbed ourselves a snack. This location I feel, showed Lucerne at its romantic best.

Of course, I guess no one goes to Lucerne without making an effort to at least  visit the dying lion monument.  "The saddest and most moving piece of rock in the world" as described by 
Mark Twain.

The perfect place for our first group photo, if I am not mistaken haha (we're always busy, busy taking photographs for keeps). It will forever remain a life long memory to treasure and share. What a fantastic way to finish our holiday in Switzerland!
Next stop, The City of Lights - Paris.