The Secrets of Interlaken

You stand in a square so quiet you can hear the fountain trickling. But in 1279, this was the epicenter of a bitter power struggle. King Rudolf I of Habsburg granted Baron Berchtold III of Eschenbach-Oberhofen the right to build a fortified town right here — on land the Augustinian monks of Interlaken Monastery claimed as their own. The monks were furious. For centuries afterward, they managed to throttle Unterseen's growth, blocking its access to the lakes and the railway line that would later transform the region.

Look at the Stadthaus dominating the square. Built in 1470, it served as the first hotel in the entire Bernese Oberland, sheltering Italian-bound cattle drivers who needed a warm bed before crossing the alpine passes. Today it's a restaurant, but the heavy timber walls remember the clatter of hooves and the smell of damp wool. Behind you rises the 13th-century church tower — the oldest structure in the area, a survivor of fires and reformation alike.

Step onto the wooden planks and listen. The Aare rushes beneath you, impossibly turquoise — glacial meltwater that has tumbled all the way from the Oberaargletscher. This covered bridge, built in 1854, is a masterpiece of Swiss carpentry: mortise-and-tenon joints, no nails in the original construction, and heavy timber trusses designed to endure spring floods. But the bridge's story is older than its planks.

Since the Middle Ages, the bridges over the Aare's many arms were the only way to get from Neuhaus on Lake Thun through Unterseen to the valleys of the Jungfrau region. Whoever controlled the bridges controlled the tolls — and the monastery grew wealthy on exactly that income. You're literally walking the line between the former municipality of Unterseen to your west and Interlaken to your east.

You push open the door of a timber-framed house on Obere Gasse and step into a peculiar museum — one dedicated not to art or war, but to the very act of being a tourist. The Tourismuseum, opened in 1980, is the first and only museum in Switzerland exclusively devoted to the history of tourism.

The story begins with landscape painters like Franz Niklaus König, whose romantic depictions of Alpine scenery in the early 1800s made wealthy Europeans desperate to see the mountains for themselves. Then came the Unspunnenfest of 1805 and 1808 — a festival celebrating Swiss folk culture that drew crowds from across the continent. By the 1820s, visitors were arriving for 'mountain air cures,' and the great hotels began rising along the Höheweg. Upstairs, you'll find vintage luggage labels, early railway posters, and photographs of mustachioed Victorian gentlemen in improbable mountaineering outfits.

You're standing before the spiritual heart of everything Interlaken once was. The Schlosskirche — the Castle Church — adjoins what remains of the Augustinian monastery founded around 1133, when Baron Seliger of Oberhofen placed his new religious community under the protection of Holy Roman Emperor Lothair. For four centuries, the monks who prayed here controlled an empire of land, churches, and toll bridges stretching across the Bernese Oberland.

The current church dates to 1471. Step inside and look up: the wooden altar from 1671 glows with a quiet warmth. But the real drama happened in 1528, when the Protestant Reformation swept through Bern. The monastery was dissolved overnight. The monks were expelled, their lands seized by the state, and the complex was converted first into a hospital, then into government offices. Today, the castle houses the administrative offices of the Oberland district — bureaucrats where monks once chanted.

Stand in the center of this vast green meadow and turn slowly. To the south, the Jungfrau massif fills the sky — its snow-capped peak glowing pink at sunset. To the north, the elegant facades of the Höheweg hotels line up like a theater audience. And all around you, 14 hectares of unbuilt parkland stretch in every direction.

In 1860, developers were circling. A group of Interlaken citizens — hoteliers, farmers, and shopkeepers — pooled their money and bought the meadow outright, placing it under permanent protection in 1864. They understood that the view of the Jungfrau was Interlaken's real currency. Today, paragliders spiral down to land here, winter brings an ice rink and Christmas markets, and summer fills the meadow with open-air concerts.

In 1856, a 22-year-old hotel pioneer named Eduard Ruchti bought a modest doctor's house called the Pension Victoria and dreamed enormous dreams. He hired architects Friedrich Studer and Horace Édouard Davinet, and after just nine months of furious construction, the Hotel Victoria opened in 1865.

In 1895, he acquired the neighboring Hotel Jungfrau (built by Davinet in 1864), and in 1899 linked the two buildings with the iconic dome-topped central tract you see today. The new Victoria-Jungfrau offered innovations unheard of in the Alps: a hydraulic lift, a telephone system, and electric light in every room. The Höheweg promenade essentially exists because of hotels like this one, which transformed a monastic meadow into the Riviera of the Alps.

In the mid-1800s, wealthy Europeans didn't just visit the Alps for scenery — they came for their health. Doctors prescribed 'mountain air cures,' and the fashionable thing was to spend weeks in an alpine resort. Interlaken needed a centerpiece for this elegant clientele, and in 1859, the Kursaal opened its doors.

The word 'Kursaal' literally means 'cure hall.' But let's be honest: the real draw was gambling. By 1883, the venue had introduced 'jeu des petits chevaux' to generate income. In 2002, the Federal Council granted the Kursaal a Type B casino concession, and it remains one of the few legal casinos in Switzerland.

Turn off the bustling Höheweg and suddenly you're in Kyoto. Stone lanterns. Raked gravel. The lazy flicker of koi carp in a still pond. The Japanese Garden of Friendship is the first Japanese garden in Switzerland.

In 1995, a landscape gardener from Otsu, Japan, traveled to Interlaken to build this garden as a living symbol of the sister-city relationship between the two towns. Like Interlaken, Otsu sits on a famous lake — Lake Biwa, Japan's largest. Every element in this garden was chosen with intention: the placement of each stone follows Japanese principles of asymmetry and naturalness.

The funicular car tilts at what feels like an impossible angle as it climbs away from the valley floor. In ten minutes, you'll ascend 734 meters — from the base station near Interlaken Ost to the summit platform at 1,321 meters. When the Harderbahn opened on May 15, 1908, it was a feat of Edwardian engineering.

At the top, step onto the viewing platform — a steel and glass structure called the 'Two Lakes Bridge' that juts out over the void like the prow of a ship. To your left, Lake Thun stretches west. To your right, Lake Brienz glows turquoise. And ahead, the triumvirate of Eiger, Mönch, and Jungfrau fills the horizon. This is the photograph. This is why people come.

The path from the parking area winds through forest and mist, following a waterfall that crashes out of the mountainside with theatrical force. You're approaching the St. Beatus Caves — one of the largest cave systems in Switzerland and the setting for a legend that has terrified and delighted visitors for over a thousand years.

In the 6th century, an Irish monk named Beatus arrived at Lake Thun and heard that a fearsome dragon lived inside these caves. Armed with nothing but a crucifix and his faith, Beatus entered the cave, confronted the dragon, and drove it out with the sign of the cross. The dragon tumbled into the lake and drowned. The caves themselves are genuinely awe-inspiring: over a kilometer of illuminated walkways winds past stalactites, stalagmites, underground lakes, and chambers that echo with dripping water.