Bern afternoon · Vingelz / Hafen

190 km from Bern

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Why this ride

A 190 km round trip from Bern - roughly 3 h 17 in the saddle. It goes by way of Rütte, Dorfstation, Segelboothafen and Vingelz / Hafen. The highest point is about 1,000 m.

Roadbook

1. Bern start

   Bern looks like a city drawn by a medieval cartographer who never doubted his own plan. It sits on a high, narrow peninsula inside a tight loop of the Aare river, with the old town packed along the ridge and steep green banks falling to the water on three sides. It was founded in 1191 by Berchtold V, Duke of Zähringen, and the legend says that he named it after the first animal he killed on a hunt, a bear. Bears are still everywhere: on the flag, on fountains, in a park beside the river where several of them live.

   The old town is a UNESCO World Heritage site, and it is worth the entry for the arcades alone. About six kilometres of sandstone arcades run along the main streets, so that shoppers walk under cover in all weather, and the streets are lined with sixteenth-century fountains, each topped by a painted figure. The Zytglogge, the clock tower, performs its mechanical show a few minutes before each hour. Albert Einstein lived in a flat on the Kramgasse while working at the patent office, and it was here in 1905 that he wrote the papers that changed physics.

   Bern is Switzerland's capital but acts like a small provincial town, with about 120,000 people, a relaxed air and a river you can swim in. On summer evenings, residents float down the Aare in the cool green water. For riders, the city is a convenient base with good roads in every direction: the Gurten hill to the south, the Emmental to the east, the Seeland and Lake Biel to the north-west. The old town centre is mostly pedestrianised and cobbled, so park outside and walk in, and watch the tram tracks, which are treacherous in the wet.

   Fuel and food are easy. Bern has stations on all approach roads, and the Marktgasse and its side streets are full of cafes and bakeries. Try a Zopf, the braided Sunday bread, or the Berner Platte, a heavy plate of boiled meats and sauerkraut, if you are hungry. Switzerland requires a motorway vignette, speed limits are strictly enforced, and fines are steep. The best months to ride are May to October, and the view from the Rosengarten across the roofs to the Alps is worth a stop.

2. Rütte sight

   Rütte sits on the gentle southern slope above Lake Biel, a scatter of farms and orchards between the village of Bellmund and the lakeshore, with the long blue ridge of the Jura filling the view across the water. Nidau and the city of Biel are a few minutes away, yet up here it feels thoroughly rural: cows, cherry trees, a sharp smell of cut grass in early summer and the clank of a tractor somewhere below.

   The reason it appears on a heritage map lies under the water and the peat along the shore. Around five to seven thousand years ago, Neolithic and Bronze Age farmers built villages on piles at the edges of the Swiss lakes, and Lake Biel is one of the richest places for their remains. The prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps were listed by UNESCO in 2011, and finds from this shore, from pottery to wooden posts preserved in the mud, have helped archaeologists date these settlements almost to the year. There is nothing dramatic to see at the site itself; the story is told in the museums of Biel, but knowing what lies just offshore changes how you look at the reeds.

   The riding is short and sweet. The lanes above the lake loop through Bellmund, Ipsach and Sutz with gentle curves, good tarmac and views opening up between the farmhouses, and you can ride on along the south shore towards Erlach and its old castle. Across the lake, the vineyard road through Twann and Ligerz clings to the Jura foot, and above it the climbs to the Chasseral or over the Jura passes give real corners. Swiss rules apply: motorway vignette required, speed limits enforced strictly and expensively, and village speed zones that change without much warning.

   For fuel and food, Nidau and Biel have everything you need. On a summer evening, take a boat out to St Peter's Island, where Jean-Jacques Rousseau spent a few happy weeks in 1765 and later wrote that he had never been so content. With a glass of local Chasselas in hand and the sun setting behind the Jura, you might understand him.

3. Dorfstation sight

   The south shore of Lake Biel is a gentle place of reeds, vineyards on the far bank and farmland stretching back towards the Seeland plain, and at Lüscherz, one of the small lakeside villages, the remains of a prehistoric pile-dwelling settlement lie in the shallows. Dorfstation, as the site is known, is part of the transnational World Heritage Site of Prehistoric Pile Dwellings around the Alps, inscribed in 2011. Neolithic and Bronze Age farmers built their houses on wooden piles along the shore, and the waterlogged ground preserved timbers, tools, textiles and food remains for thousands of years.

   Nothing is visible from the shore: the remains are underwater or buried in mud. But knowing they are there changes how you look at the lake. People have been living, fishing and farming here for six thousand years.

   Across the water, St Peter's Island, actually a peninsula since the lake level was lowered in the nineteenth century, is where Jean-Jacques Rousseau spent a few happy weeks in 1765, later writing that they were among the best of his life. On the north shore, the wine villages of Twann, Ligerz and La Neuveville cling to the slopes beneath the Jura, and their white wines are worth tasting.

   The riding around Lake Biel is varied. The south shore roads are flat and pastoral, through villages and fields of vegetables, as the Seeland is Switzerland's market garden. The north shore road is busier and squeezed between the lake, the railway and the vineyards. For real curves, climb into the Jura: the road from La Neuveville or Nods up to the Chasseral, the highest point of the Bernese Jura, offers a fine climb with views over three lakes and, on clear days, the whole chain of the Alps. Swiss speed limits are strictly enforced, and the fines can be eye-watering.

   Erlach, four kilometres away, is a charming small town with a castle, a covered arcade street and a lakeside promenade. For fuel and more services, head to Ins or to Nidau and Biel at the north-eastern end of the lake. Remember that Swiss motorways require a vignette, and that many roads in the Jura can be foggy in autumn.

4. Segelboothafen sight

   Murten is the rare Swiss town where you can walk the medieval walls almost all the way round, looking down on brown tiled roofs on one side and the lake on the other. Its sailing harbour, the Segelboothafen, lies just below the old town on the shore of Lake Murten, and in the shallows here are the remains of prehistoric pile dwellings, one of the Swiss components of the transnational World Heritage Site of Prehistoric Pile Dwellings around the Alps. Nothing shows above the water, but the lakeshore has been a place to live for thousands of years.

   Murten's most famous date is 1476. Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, besieged the town, and the Swiss Confederates came to its relief and crushed his army in a battle that ended Burgundian ambitions in the region. Legend has it that a runner carried the news to Fribourg, collapsing as he arrived with a linden twig in his hand; a modern race between the two towns commemorates it every autumn. The town is bilingual, Murten in German and Morat in French, and its arcaded main street is full of shops, cafés and restaurants.

   Across the lake rises Mont Vully, a long, low hill covered with vineyards on its southern slope, which produces some of Switzerland's most pleasant white wines. On its summit are the remains of a Celtic oppidum, and the views over the three lakes of the region, Murten, Neuchâtel and Biel, are wide. The local speciality is the gâteau du Vully, a flat, sweet bread topped with cream and sugar, which goes very well with a glass of Chasselas.

   The riding is relaxed. The roads around the lake and through the Vully are gentle, with vineyards and villages, and the Seeland to the north is flat farmland. For more excitement, the Jura is within an hour, with the climbs to the Chasseral or the Vue des Alpes. Swiss rules apply: low speed limits, strict enforcement and a vignette for motorways. The lake is popular with cyclists and walkers, so watch out on the narrow roads near the water.

   Murten has fuel and all services. Park outside the walls, walk through the old town, climb the ramparts and end at the harbour, where a swim or a boat ride on the lake on a hot day washes off the road dust nicely.

5. Vingelz / Hafen turn

   Biel and Bienne are the same city, one name in German and one in French, and street signs, conversations and even jokes switch between the two languages without anyone noticing. At its western edge, the lakeside district of Vingelz, with its small harbour, has given archaeologists remains of prehistoric pile dwellings in the shallow water of Lake Biel, and the site is one piece of the World Heritage property for pile dwellings around the Alps. The lake, long and narrow, lies at the foot of the Jura mountains, and its shores have been inhabited for thousands of years.

   Biel is the capital of Swiss watchmaking, home to Omega, Swatch and the movement factories that supply some of the most famous names in the business, and a museum tells the story. The old town, on a hill above the modern centre, has fountains, arcades and medieval houses. A funicular climbs to Magglingen, or Macolin, on the slopes of the Jura, with views over the lake and the Alps, and the Taubenloch gorge offers a walk through a narrow canyon. In the lake, St Peter's Island, connected to the shore by a narrow strip of land, was where Jean-Jacques Rousseau spent a happy few weeks in 1765.

   The riding is excellent. The road along the northern shore of the lake runs between vineyards and the water, through the wine villages of Twann and Ligerz, with tunnels and views, though it can be busy. Above, the roads climb into the Jura, with curves, forests and pastures, toward the Chasseral, the highest summit in the region, reached by a road with views over the Alps on clear days. The surface is excellent, and traffic is light on minor roads. Speed limits are strict, and the police are vigilant. Weather is variable, with fog in autumn and winter, and snow on the high roads.

   Nidau and Biel have fuel, shops, restaurants and hotels. Food here mixes Swiss German and French traditions, with lake fish, especially perch and whitefish, wines from the northern shore, mostly Chasselas, and treats like the Treberwurst, a sausage cooked in grape pomace, a winter speciality of the wine villages. A meal by the lake in Ligerz or Twann is lovely. Park at Vingelz, look out over the water, and imagine the prehistoric villages in the shallows, their smoke rising against the green slopes of the Jura.

6. back through Segelboothafen stop

   back through Segelboothafen comes up 119 km in.

7. back through Dorfstation stop
8. back through Rütte stop

   back through Rütte, late in the day.

9. Bern finish

   The route ends here after 190 km.

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