Berne, Switzerland

We had a couple hours in the Canton of Bears before our train left for Interlaken, so we decided to explore!  Sara was really keen on seeing the bears:

"Bridget, there's a bear pit!  We have to go see them!" 

"Wait, they're in a pit?  Why are they in a pit?  Do they make them fight or something?" 

"No, no, it's more like a zoo.  But only with bears." 

"So it's like a zoo.  But only with a couple of bears...?"

"Yes.  It's the canton's animal.  So they have bears."

And believe it or not, Wikipedia tells me that Berne has kept captive bears in the city since 1440.  Kind of astonishing. 

Bern is also one of the top ten cities for quality of life in the world (along with Vienna, Zurich, Auckland, Munich, Vancouver, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Geneva and Copenhagen) - and is the fifth largest city in Switzerland, after Zürich, Geneva, Basel, and Lausanne.

At The Spaghetti Factory for lunch.

It is also smothered in electric cables and wires.  Tragic.

Da Bears used to be on a small pit on the other side of the hill, but now they have a lovely new habitat, everything between the two large fences.

Da Bears!  In a new and improved habitat.

The water is the most amazing sea foam green color, from all of the glacial deposits.

Walking down to put our feet in (it was a hot day!)

The view from our perch.

The water was moving very, very, fast.  Not for the faint of heart...though we did see a few people floating down the river in some strange, fast moving parody of a lazy river.