When we were planning our move to the Netherlands we knew we wanted to travel a bit before Jack started his program in September. Jack’s a big fan of big mountains and the outdoors, and I love all things pretty cities and landscapes, so we decided that Swizterland would be the perfect place to spend a few weeks exploring before settling into our new home. This was a dream trip for us because we had originally wanted to travel in Europe for our honeymoon, but we ended up booking a trip to Kauai last minute so we could just relax and enjoy being newlyweds without having to plan too much right after the wedding.

We outlined a basic driving itinerary of what we wanted to see and where we wanted to go, hitting the major cities like Lucern and Bern while spending the majority of our time in the mountains around Interlaken and Zermatt. We knew we couldn’t miss Chamonix right across the French border(which ended up being a highlight of the trip!) and ended our trip with a quick jaunt around Lake Geneva on our way back to the airport. We spent ten days in Switzerland which was the perfect amount of time to spend 2-3 nights in each of these places with ample time for driving between spots. While Switzerland by train is apparently the cool thing to do, driving allowed us to stop for stunning views, be on our own schedule in terms of where we wanted to go and when, and jam out to a few select songs from our iphones when we realized we had no podcasts or playlists.

I brought along way too many cameras and gear to capture our trip, but my favorite to explore the cities with was my Contax 645 (even though it was so heavy and big to lug around!)  and one of my favorite cities to photograph was Bern. We wandered the streets a bit, grabbed a coffee in the park at Einstein Kaffe, which had a gorgeous view of the river and some stunning river front properties. We were only there for an hour or two, but it’s definitely a city we’ll want to come back and explore more.

My absolute favorite city to photograph and explore was the town of Solothun. Solothun was a random stop based on our guide book’s recommendation that it was “the most beautiful Baroque city in Switzerland”,  and it did not disappoint. It ended up being one of our favorite towns in all of Switerland. With tons of open squares filled with cafes, colorful buildings, cute shops and beautiful alleyways, we were in heaven exploring this place. We stopped for an espresso and afternoon treat at Restaurant Bistraito, which had awesome people watching and fun street music to entertain. We both agreed that when we come back to this area we have to stay in Solothun instead of Interlaken for it’s quaint, cozy atmosphere and tons of yummy restaurants!