Day 4: Rivers and Lakes

Interlachen means “between lakes.” It is the land between the Lake Thun and Lake Brienz in central Switzerland. We made a day trip out of a drive first to Thun, then to Interlaken.

Breakfast was in the hotel this morning, a rather standard European breakfast of cereals, croissants, bread, fruit, eggs, cheese and juice. It was served nicely on the 1^st floor of the hotel.

I had noticed the green water of the Aare River in Bern yesterday, and immediately recalled one other vacation where we saw green water. It was our trip to Alberta, and the reason for the green water was rock sediment scraped by glaciers. That was my first thought yesterday, and Ellen's research today confirmed the source of the Aare is glacier water. We saw the pretty green water all day in the lakes and rivers near Thun.

We enjoyed having the car today, as we headed towards Interlachen, but then decided to take in the quaint town of Thun along the way. After a brief stop there, we drove just along the southern edge of the lake, which gave great views of mountains and cottages built into the hills.

Interlachen is mainly a touristy town. We walked the main street, picking up a gift for Andrea (who probably isn't reading this, so the gift was a &*())^&%$*^%^). We saw dozens of paragliders in the air at one time, then walked to the park where they all landed (is that what you did, Tulasi?). There were great views of the Eiger, Monch and Jungfaujoch mountains, with Jungfaujoch still snow covered. Lunch was from a grocery store in Interlachen.

We arrived back in Bern around 5pm. Dinner tonight was at the Rathskeller Restaurant, where Ellen had a peppercorn steak and I had perch on a bed of spinach. Both were delicious. We walked down to explore the train station because, well, Ellen likes train stations.

Tomorrow we are off to Zurich for the day, then to our next hotel in Lucerne.