The One with Thun, Switzerland and the Bern Temple

After a wonderful morning exploring the Alpine towns of Mürren and Gimmelwald, we rested up at the apartment and then headed back out to see more more more! We drove once again towards Interlaken to the city of Thun ("toon") to see some castles. We passed Thun Castle.

Chris said it didn't look too impressive when he researched it, but when we drove by we were wishing we'd allowed some time to get out of the car and see it because it looked awesome IRL! (In Real Life).

But what we came to see was the Oberhofen Castle. I mean, wow.

A view from every angle because I can never ever narrow it down. Google "Thun" and this is what pops up most, this here castle.

Built between 1180 and 1190 by the Dukes of Zähringen, the castle houses a five-floor historical museum offering insights into the cultural development of the region over a period of some 4000 years. It was closed by the time we got there, but that's okay, we still got to see the exterior!

I'll take a castle on the water pretty please!

We walked out to the terrace.

The water is CRAZY blue!

The clouds rollin' in.

Looking in the opposite direction. Reminds me of our view in Bern and it also reminds me of Sammamish Washington. Sigh. I miss home sometimes :)

Even though the castle interior was closed, the grounds are always open so in we went through the gate.

Manicured gardens and red flowers shaped like the Swiss flag. 

Fox and Jane found a stray cat and gave it lots of loves. Well, Jane just mauled it. Still working on "gentle."

Pretty pink flowers. Love how the trees framed these roses and the aqua blue lake in the background.

Vine covered walkway. Jane looks like a little ghost!

Colorful flowers. The vine covered walkway in color.

Oops, another view of the castle :)

This is the courtyard of the castle. Seems that most castles we saw in Switzerland had black/white striped shutters. I wonder if that's a palace/castle requirement?

The kids were done exploring for the day so we let them play on the playground. Except this was like a "hard core parkour" playground that Chris and I couldn't "figure out"! Luckily there was a smaller, more young-kid-friendly playground nearby that kept the kids happy until we said it was time to go walk around just a bit more.

Just some more fancy schmancy Swiss buildings.

In case you can't tell, I really like flowers on windowsills.

That concludes our adventures in Thun, Switzerland!

"On the way" (which wasn't on the way at all) back to the apartment we stopped to see the Bern temple. We've lived in Germany almost a year and have yet to see a temple! Back in the states we made it a point to go "temple hopping" and saw many-a-temple frequently! Shame on us... We even wanted to do a session and switch off watching the kids, but of course it was closed for cleaning and construction the weekend we were there. Bummer! 

Nevertheless, we still enjoyed seeing the temple and knowing we were surrounded by people with the same core beliefs.

Bern temple from all sides.

More pretty pink flowers!

The LDS chapel is right next door to the temple. Would have been fun to go to church in Switzerland!

And if you've ever wondered what a "Mormon Home Shop" looks like, well, here ya go!

We drove back to our apartment in Bern for one last night. After the kids had gone to sleep we were resting and looking at our phones when all of a sudden we heard load cheering all around us from every window! Apparently Switzerland won their World Cup match :) It was a neat experience.

Our final stop: Zürich, Switzerland!