Bulle to Bern - Poking Around Europe 6.0 - CycleBlaze

June 11, 2019

Bulle to Bern

Dry is Better Than Wet

We went to bed thinking we might be taking the train to Bern and woke up to a somewhat brighter day and it wasn’t raining. Hooray!  We were biking. Of course that is exactly how yesterday started out and we got drenched, but we felt optimistic and could always hop on a train in Fribourg if we needed to.  

We did a quick spin around Bulle before we left and it is absolutely lovely. Yesterday’s weather wasn’t conducive to sight seeing, that is for sure.  Bulle deserved more time than we able to give it. 

The turrets on this castle dominate the old town.
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One of the main streets.
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A church on the way out of town.
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Looking back at the castle.
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Then we were off on a spectacular ride. The kind of riding we just love. Rolling hills, beautiful scenery, charming small villages, low traffic or no traffic and no rain. We kept commenting to each other how much we were loving it.  Keith doesn’t typically use the route planner on Guru but their were so many choices of route today he let Guru do the choosing and it was outstanding.  Lots of elevation in those rolling hills...we climbed 879 m today. 

Beautiful valley.
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Lovely lake.
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Can you find the blue sky in this picture?
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It does seem miraculous that it never rained, doesn’t it, but it didn’t. Not a drop.
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There is one of the rolling hills!
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We were sometimes on low traffic roads like this. The Swiss drivers were incredibly good. They don’t pass if they can’t move right over.
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Hmmmm. Another rolling hill. We went up and down all day.
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There are mountains above those hills, we just couldn’t see them.
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We came across this tiny chapel along the route.
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We stopped in Fribourg for our picnic, and then negotiated our way out of town. It was a much larger place than I had realized, but the CN led us right through. A long stretch was on a bus/bike lane. We love these. It works so well. We had one coming into Bern as well. 

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Bikes and beautiful building in Fribourg.
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We love the pedestrian areas.
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Here is a really unique part of the bike route, running under the railway. We think it may have been the original railway.
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Rod BlastYes! It‘s exatly the same bridge.
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2 months ago
The CN himself riding across.
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Then there was more amazing riding and more rolling terrain. It was a fantastic ride. There was always something to look at, the road surfaces were great. 

On the left you can see a wee bit of mountain if you look carefully.
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The chief photographer noticed this.
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Autoroute in the distance.
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The girls having lunch.
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More rolling hills.
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This was an amazing old building.
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Poppies, blue flowers and dramatic skies.
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A sweet trailside companion until...
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He decided that my pannier just might be edible. He had his teeth right in my bag and I moved out of there in a quick hurry.
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Bern is incredibly bike friendly and there were no issues getting into town, other than remembering to be aware of other bikes. There are so many. We did have one funny thing happen though. We are staying in an Ibis and there are two in Bern. Keith led us straight to the wrong one. Oops. A few km later, and having had the absolute pleasure of riding through the centre of Bern, we were there. 

Bern is gorgeous and we are staying here for two nights so we can spend all day tomorrow exploring it. It really is a stunning place. 

This is the monument of the Universal Postal Union. Here is Berna holding the city coat of arms.
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Five figures, representing Africa, Asia, the Americas, Australia and Europe are handing mail to each other, symbolizing communication around the world. The sculpture was unveiled in 1909.
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The Bellevue. Another hotel to splurge on.
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One of several pedestrian streets we saw riding through.
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We are comfortable in the Ibis. Our room overlooks the National Equestrian Centre and I watched dressage practice and jumping practice. It is a huge complex. We will take some pictures in the morning. 

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An interesting profile. Lots of up, but overall we went down.
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Today's ride: 76 km (47 miles)
Total: 2,230 km (1,385 miles)

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