Continuing with our long weekend in Interlaken …
Interlaken’s hotels are expensive and they are often fully booked. Our hotel is BeauSite located in the next town – Unterseen.
It is a family-owned hotel which has a nice little seating area in front and ample parking spaces. It was impossible to find parking in Interlaken … we tried.
Unterseen is really about 5-10 minutes walk from Interlaken’s main drag – Höheweg – and just because it is situated across the river Aare – there is hardly any tourists.
The River Aare connects Lake Thun and Lake Brienz – the “inter” part of Interlaken.
We joined a free walking tour and the guide took us treking across the river and up onto a trail just above the town. Poor Sue, her feet suffered for not having the right shoes.
The trail offered wonderful views of Interlaken – it was not so far up where everything appears tiny. One can just see Lake Thun in a distance
in the above photo – looking west – just when sun was setting.
Looking just across town – the backs of the old grand hotels on Höheweg are visible in the middle.
And looking east, Höhematte (the big lawn in the center of town) is in the foreground (of the photo below).
Our little tour looped into Unterseen via a riverside walk before crossing the Aare and then turning back into the town center.
So peaceful.
Our walk around town took us near the funicular that connects Interlaken with the nearest summit – Harderkulm at 1323 meters (4341 feet) – which affords one a bird’s eye view of the town. Didn’t go there, we were quite happy with what we saw already.
Near the funicular station is a small zoo – better described as a fenced-off area – where a few mountain sheep/goat is kept. What puzzled me was the height of the huts – are there two floors inside ?
As expected, the town is full of restaurants including many ethnic restaurants – for the home-sick tourists who cannot deal with daily European meals. Well, we had a Korean dinner one night (Sue cannot resist it) and a generic “middle-eastern” on another. The best dinner we had was Italian at Citta Vecchia just down the street from our hotel – simple risotto con porcini and pasta alla vongole – it tasted great! It is one of those mythical little Italian restaurants which every couple knows at least one.
Another restaurant that was recommended to us by our guide was the “Bear” which serves traditional Swiss fare and is also just down the street. We did not have a chance to try it and we avoided all the steak places and continental restaurants in the town center.
Our hotel room has a direct view of the famous Jungfrau – 4158 meters (13,641 feet). But on the first day, visibility is zero.
On the last day – the day we went up there, the weather was cooperating.
More pictures on our trip up Jungfrau to come …