Rain, music, flowers and birds

Today has been rainy, rainy, rainy.  We stayed indoors until noon and then slogged into town to get SIM cards for our phones.  Bern boasts the longest covered shopping "arcade" in the world which basically means you can fold up your umbrella as you walk along a covered sidewalk outside the stores lining both sides of the street in the old town area.  This goes on for blocks and blocks.  And it wasn't too crowded as it was Sunday and only tourists were downtown.  All the locals knew that there were no shops open on Sunday anyway!

After our errand, we wandered to the River Aare, and walked upstream, heading away from town and towards the music coming from the Gurten Folk Festival.  We discovered that there are miles of trail along the river, and also up the local hill.  We couldn't access the Gurten hill today without paying a steep fee as the music festival is up at the top and costs 80 Swiss Franc's each day -  basically $100.  The four day festival, that is just wrapping up, included 66 artists, lots of DJ's, three stages, three dance tents, a camping area, and lots of bars.  Some of the highlight musicians are Chromeo and Arctic Monkeys for you music buffs.

On the way back home, we saw some beautiful gardens with fun sculptures and baubles in them, as well as a hanging sculpture over the trail.  We wound our way through the part of the "Tierpark" (zoo) we didn't have to pay for and saw some nice flamingo's as well!

There are snail shells in the wood sculpture on right

Cool sculpture overhead!

The flamingos didn't seem to mind the rain.