Three days in Bern: a capital small enough to swim through at lunchtime
Two nights inside a bend of the Aare, with arcades the length of the old town, a clock that performs every hour, Einstein's flat and a Renzo Piano gallery full of Paul Klee.
- Length
- 3 days, 2 nights
- Where you stay
- Berne
- Places
- 7 across 3 days
Bern is the seat of the Swiss government and it does not behave like it. The old town is a sandstone peninsula inside a loop of the Aare, small enough to cross in twenty minutes, and on a hot afternoon the civil servants walk upstream, get into the river in their swimming things and let the current carry them back to the office.
It was founded in 1191, ran itself as the largest city-state north of the Alps, joined the Swiss Confederation in 1353, and was made the federal capital only in 1848, which may be why the place still feels like a market town that agreed to hold the parliament as a favour.
What you actually walk through is six kilometres of arcades, a clock tower with fifteenth-century animatronics, a flat where Einstein rewrote physics in his spare time, a pit of bears the city has kept for centuries and one of the best modern art buildings in the country.
Highlights
- The Zytglogge's hourly performance: jester, cockerel, bear parade, and a knight striking the hour
- Einstein's rented flat on the main street, lived in through the year he changed physics
- The Zentrum Paul Klee, a building of three concrete waves holding four thousand works by one man
- The rose garden above the bear enclosure, which is where the postcard was taken from
- Floating down the Aare in summer, the way the city gets through July
Where to stay
Bern, two nights
Sleep inside the old town if you can. It is a UNESCO site, the streets are arcaded end to end, and the station is at the top of it, so arriving and leaving cost you five minutes on foot.
This is a small capital, about 135,000 people, and it empties in the evening. That is a feature: the old town after eight is one of the quietest and best-looking places in Europe to walk around after dinner.
Day by day
Day 1 in Berne
The arcades, the clock tower, and Einstein's flat
Walk down the main street from the station and you are in it: an unbroken run of arcades over sandstone facades, fountains with painted figures on top standing in the middle of the road, and cellar doors angled into the pavement, most of them now bars and shops.
Halfway along stands the Zytglogge. It has been a city gate, a guard tower and a prison for women convicted of sleeping with priests, and since the fifteenth century it has carried an astronomical clock. A few minutes before every hour a jester rings his bells, a procession of bears goes round, a cockerel crows and a knight in armour strikes the hour. Arrive early, stand back a little, and do not expect it to last long.
A hundred metres further on, at Kramgasse 49, is the flat Albert Einstein rented while he was working as a clerk at the patent office. He lived here through 1905, the year he published the papers on special relativity and the photoelectric effect, and the rooms are furnished as they were. It takes twenty minutes and it is the best twenty minutes in the city.
- 13:00
Arrive at Bern railway station
TravelThe station sits at the neck of the old town, so everything below is five to fifteen minutes away on foot and under cover most of the way.
- 15:00
Zytglogge
HistoricThe old clock tower and its astronomical clock. The mechanical figures perform a few minutes before each hour, so be there by ten to.
- 16:15
Einsteinhaus
CultureTwo rooms on Kramgasse where Einstein lived during the year he changed physics. Small, cheap and worth it.
- 19:30
Restaurant Zunft zu Webern
EatGuild-house cooking in the old town: fondue, soups and Bernese standards, with half portions if you want them.
With more time: With more time, walk to the far end of the peninsula and back along the other side. The two streets are different in character, and the fountains, all sixteenth century, are worth reading as a set.
Day 2 in Berne
The bears, the rose garden and four thousand Klees
Cross the bridge at the eastern end of the old town to the bear enclosure on the far bank. Bern has kept bears since the middle ages, which sits differently with different visitors; the modern version is a wooded slope running down to the river with a tunnel under the road, and the animals swim in the Aare in summer.
Climb the path behind it to the Rosengarten. It is a municipal park with a couple of hundred rose varieties and, more to the point, the view: the whole old town laid out inside its river bend, red roofs and green copper spires. Locals eat lunch here. So should you.
In the afternoon, take bus 12 out to the Zentrum Paul Klee, where Renzo Piano built three grass-covered waves in a field on the edge of the city. Klee left about four thousand works and the museum owns a large share of them, so what is on the walls changes every few months and is never the same show twice.
- 10:00
Bear Pit
OtherThe city's bears, in a riverside enclosure below the bridge with a tunnel through from the road. Free, and busiest at feeding time.
- 11:15
Rosengarten
NatureA rose garden on the slope above the bears, looking straight back at the roofs and spires. Bus 12 if you would rather not climb.
- 14:00
Zentrum Paul Klee
CultureRenzo Piano's three waves in a field east of the centre, holding the world's largest Klee collection. Rotating shows, so check what is up.
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With more time: With more time, the hill south of the city has a funicular, a park and a view along the whole Bernese Alps, and it is fifteen minutes from the station.
Day 3 in Berne
Parliament square and the Kunstmuseum before the train
Bundesplatz is two minutes from the station and worth standing in for a moment. The parliament building was finished in 1902, a domed sandstone block with the two chambers either side of it, and the square in front has a fountain of twenty-six jets, one for each canton, that children run through all summer. Free guided tours go inside when parliament is not sitting, and there are seats in the public gallery when it is.
Then the Kunstmuseum, five minutes north. It is the oldest permanent art museum in the country and covers eight centuries, but the reason to go is Swiss: Ferdinand Hodler's mountains and portraits, and Meret Oppenheim, with Picasso and the international names alongside.
The station is a short walk back, and this whole morning can be done with a suitcase in a locker there.
- 09:30
Bundeshaus
ArchitectureThe Swiss parliament, opened in 1902. Free tours when the chambers are not sitting, booked online, and a public gallery when they are.
- 10:45
Kunstmuseum
CultureEight centuries of art, strongest on Hodler, Oppenheim and the Swiss moderns, with Picasso in the mix. Ten minutes from the station.
- 14:00
Train from Bern railway station
TravelAn hour to Zurich, Basel or Lucerne, fifty minutes to Interlaken, under two hours to Geneva or Milan-bound connections at Brig.
With more time: With a later train, the historical museum across the bridge holds the Bernese collections and a good Einstein wing, and the Alpine museum next door explains what you will be looking at if you are heading for the mountains.
Before you go
Getting in and getting around
Bern sits at the hub of the Swiss network: an hour from Zurich, Basel and Lucerne, under two from Geneva, fifty minutes from Interlaken. The airport at Belp is tiny, so most people fly to Zurich or Geneva and take the train, which is quick and runs every half hour.
The old town needs no transport at all. Everything within the river bend is walkable, and the two things outside it, the Paul Klee centre and the rose garden, sit on the same bus route out of the station.
Buy a day pass rather than singles if you plan to use the buses twice, and note that hotels hand guests a transport ticket for the length of their stay.
The river
From roughly June to September the Aare is the main event. People walk or take a bus upstream, get in, and float down to the public baths at Marzili, which are free and have lawns, a restaurant and lifeguards.
It is not a swimming pool. The water is cold and moves fast, the exit points come up quicker than you expect and visitors have drowned here. Watch what the locals do, get out where they get out, and do not attempt it if you are not a confident swimmer.
When to go
Summer, if you want the river. Spring and autumn are pleasant and quiet, and the arcades mean that rain matters less here than in most cities: you can shop, eat and cross the whole old town without ever leaving cover.
In July the hill above the city holds a four-day open-air music festival that brings in tens of thousands of people, so check the dates before you book a room.
Bern is the most underrated city in Switzerland and the easiest to like. Nothing about it is showy: a medieval street plan, an hourly clock show, a good gallery, a river full of swimming bureaucrats, all of it inside a twenty minute walk.
It is also the middle of the map. Almost anywhere in the country is inside two hours by train from the platform you arrived on, which makes two nights here an easy thing to fit into a longer trip.
Or make it a longer trip
These trips pass through here on the way somewhere else.
Make it your trip
Every stop, day and place here lands in your account as an editable trip. Move the days around, swap a city, add your own bookings and costs, and share it with whoever is coming.
Common questions
- How many days do you need in Bern?
- Two nights is right. The old town is small enough to see in an afternoon, and the extra day buys you the Paul Klee centre, the bears and the rose garden without hurrying. People who only stop for a few hours between trains see the arcades and miss everything else.
- Is Bern worth visiting if you have already seen Zurich?
- Yes, because they are nothing alike. Zurich is a working financial city with a lake; Bern is a medieval sandstone town inside a river loop that happens to hold the government. It is quieter, cheaper to eat in and much better preserved, and it is an hour away by train.
- Can you swim in the Aare?
- In summer, yes, and it is the local ritual: walk upstream, get in, float down to the free baths at Marzili. The current is strong and cold, though, the exits arrive fast and people have drowned. Go with somebody who has done it, or watch a few rounds before you try.
- Is Bern a good base for the mountains?
- One of the best. Interlaken is fifty minutes away, which puts the Jungfrau region within reach of a day trip, and Lucerne, Basel and Zurich are each about an hour in the other direction. Copy this plan and add a mountain day on the front or the back.