I would have missed the irony if Patrick hadn't translated: "bikes parked here will be removed at owner's expense". You can see that this sign is clearly being disregarded and as far as the eye can see there were bikes parked along that railing...We climbed aboard the first of only three modes of transport today...train, bus, train to get to Gruyères...the cheese making town. Just look at this webbed mass of train tracks...I am surprised they don't have problems more often!
The first train was a double decker and we secured our favorite upper level seating arrangement:
Guess what? With our Swiss pass yet another free admission! Brian is going to have to tally up all the $ we've saved with the pass because it has been a lot! A woman dressed in a milk maid outfit explained the system of the self-guided tour. We each got one of these things that looked like a huge remote control. You could program it in different languages to hear Cherry the cow explain her story of making milk...we walked along as we viewed pictures of cows, pastures, different flowers, etc. Then there was a part where you could smell each of the different types of flowers and herbs that the cows eat in the local pastures including herbs such as cumin, jasmine and vanilla orchids (something tells me this was not entirely true...if an orchid cannot survive my apartment it certainly cannot survive the hills of Switzerland!). All in all Cherry claimed that milk and the cheese that is ultimately produced can have as many as 76 different flavors depending on what the cow ate while grazing (my sense of taste is certainly not as astute) for an average of 100 kilos of grass (what?!) and 85 liters of water (omg) every single day to make 25 liters of milk. They gave us some cheese samples to taste at various stages of aging...6 months, 8 months, 10 months...I could only detect the flavor of cheese, haha! I also did not know that cows have 4 stomachs?! Learn something new every day...
So then the cows are milked by a machine and 400 liters of milk are pooled together to make just one batch of cheese or a 35 kilo round. No wonder cheese is so damn expensive! The milk is collected over a 24 hour period and is then pooled all together (I am assuming the nutritional composition is more balanced this way)...the cheesemaker was actively making one batch as we walked through in a giant cooper vat...
Then they add enzymes to the milk to make it form into curds...I will not tell you where the enzymes come from mostly because I hope to forget. Once the cheese has curded they form it into a spring form like pan and then place it in a salt bath to suck out some of the moisture before storage on spruce shelves in a temperature and humidity (95%) room where it is flipped and brushed with salt once a day and matured over a certain period of time...6 months would be mild cheese that's softer in texture.
We left the cheese factory after acing Cherry's final exam:
And headed up to the castle...this was quite a steep journey and I myself would have preferred a gondola. But the hills all around were beautiful and alive with the sound of music so Yetta and I tortured the boys with our singing en route while they reminded us, once again, that the movie took place in Austria. Meh. Tell me these hills are not alive:
We finally got to the top and there was this really cute cobblestone street of shops, restaurants and a fountain leading the way to the castle. We stopped for a bite and of course all our meals included local cheese. Jul- if waitressing is not for you then this place certainly isn't! Almost every dish comes with this Swiss contraption with a flame underneath to keep your food steamy...
We also got free admission to the castle but I passed mine on to Yetta who was really excited to check it out. Patrick and I stayed outside and enjoyed the scenery and once they were out we had 18 minutes to make it all the way back down to the train. The task seemed impossible but we accomplished it.
We got a quick coffee in Bulle while we waited for our next connecting train (and Patrick headed back to Berne to finish his lecture)...and we took our last train to Broc where a massive white building forms the Swiss chocolate company Cailler...we arrived just in time to get into the final English tour...which was a series of rooms (first down a Wonkavator) pumped with a chocolate aroma in each taking us through chocolate's tumultuous past and origins in South America.
Chocolate cannot be grown in Switzerland as the climate is not tropical to support to cocoa plant, but it was the Swiss who first added lait or milch (milk) to the chocolate and thus created their own booming chocolate industry. They buy their cocoa beans from all around the world:
Brian was very excited about the chocolate factory:
And the songs of the sound of music were replaced with songs of Willy Wonka.
We continued on and got to see how they make their signature candy (which comes in all different color packages and yet is all the same)...and got to taste it at the very end. Who knew chocolate tasting could be so complicated?
Just when we thought the tour was over, we ended up in the tasting room...a series of tables with samples of pretty much every kind of chocolate they make...
Soon back on the train where Brian Totally disregarded all of the Swiss transportation warning signs:
Not sure how we could even think about dinner after all that chocolate but we started making plans for just one more authentic Swiss meal...Yetta took us to downtown Berne for a special treat of Swiss rosti- shredded potatoes topped with whatever you like...in my case cheese and vegetables...I could hardly make a dent in this!
Our last night in Berne was a good one...we thanked Yetta for being such a great host all week and hopped on our final mode of transport to get back to her place...the number 12 bus. We just about collapsed into bed at the end of this cheese and chocolate filled day...only one more day in Switzerland :(
Location:Rue Jules Bellet,Broc,Switzerland
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