Berne & Lucerne

When our daughter and son-in-law decided to move to Switzerland last year we were super excited for them. Still are of course. What could be better than getting to live in a post card and getting paid to do it? Plus, now that we’re in the same time zone for at least a little while we get to see each other way more often.

So we decided that since we’re all Canadians and used to a family dinner of turkey & stuffing on the second weekend in October, we would celebrate Canadian Thanksgiving together at their place in Berne Switzerland. By the way, Thanksgiving is not celebrated in Europe the way it is in North America. Not even close. Some churches may have a special harvest service, but that’s about it.

Erwin has been to visit T & H in Switzerland a couple of times, in fact he even found their apartment for them, but I have only seen the dramatic scenery in the pictures that T posts on her blog and on FB. Besides wanting to share Thanksgiving dinner with them I also wanted to see this post card they live in for myself. So we took a very loooong but direct train from Berlin to Berne with frozen turkey pieces (meat is stupid expensive there) and German dill pickles in our suitcase to spend the weekend with them.

Weather wise wasn’t too bad, could have been worse. The Alps that are visible from their balcony were hazy, and a mist had settled in the valley and over Lac Lucerne, but the sun did break through enough at times in order to give a glimpse.

We packed a lot into the few days; in spite of the horrible-terrible-lost-my-voice-very-bad- cold that I had. We strolled the cobblestone streets of Berne, peeking into shops here and there, stopping for Glühwein (me) and Beer (them) and to people watch.

A Bernese mountain dog relaxing at an outdoor cafe in Berne...cliche I know, but I had to take this photo...bought my self a stuffed one, since the owner probably wouldn't have let me take this one.

One of the restaurants is right beside a bear pit, it's even called the Bärengraben (bearpit) Brasserie.

We went to the Swiss Toy Convention which happened to be going on in Berne .... lots of fun.

Scarey rolling balance thing.

For a moment I did consider buying an 18000 piece puzzle

A trip to the Communications Museum was also in order...the research part of this trip.

The name of the computer exhibits. Geek humour.

We had on like that...I feel sooo old.

We also took the hour long train from Berne through the beautiful Swiss country side to Lucerne to visit the glass factory. 

*Insert imaginary non-hazy-drizzly-foggy alpine photo not taken from a moving train here*

There we got to try our hand our more accurately our mouth at blowing our won Christmas Tree ornament.

Erwin blows...LOL

Liquid glass ready to be molded.

 We of course enjoyed our turkey dinner, and Skyped with our son in Lloydminster, Alberta...

 

 ...soooo thankful for family and spending time with them not matter how or where.