Now this is a proper Swiss "river," running straight and orderly as all Swiss waterways should. Note: An untamed creek/river ran alongside it. The Swiss are not to be outdone, they will have every kind of waterway.
TAUBENLOCH, BIEL/BIENNE, SWITZERLAND I received a note from one of my darling nieces this week (I have 11, no wait, that’s 12 nieces, plus one genius-Goddaughter), asking for my advice on where to travel as she’s planning to trot across Europe next spring.
The thing is, there are so many places to go that she could play pin-the-tail on the European map and land just about anywhere interesting, except for Olten, which we have already established is not worth visiting.
The Taubenloch gorge trail criss-crosses the Suze River as it falls from the Jura Mountains down into Lac Biel/Bienne.
But, Olten aside, we have done some random drop-in touring and been pleasantly surprised, as we saw on our trip to Thun, the not-so-well-known Swiss settlement north of the Bernese Mountains. Although it receives as little attention as Olten when it comes to tour guides and online searches, it turned out to be a fabulous place. Click here and here to see past posts and pics on Thun.
Europe is full of such lovely finds and not just in medieval villages, cathedrals, castles and pastries. We discovered a treasure in a canyon trail just north of our town of Biel/Bienne.
It swoops down into a steep limestone carved gorge that bellies out in a fast-moving river, or maybe creek. It’s not clear to me what qualifies as a river, as I’ve seen “rivers” in Spain that had all the panache of the ditch that ran in front of our small-town-BC home back in the 1990s. Yet the Spaniards called this worm of a waterway a “river.” Fascinating people, the Spanish.
You can understand that when someone describes something as “fantastic” to me, I reserve judgment until laying my own eyes on the thing. This is what happens to people who have lived in Spain. They are forever sceptical about everything.
Check out the metal railing, bowed by falling rock. The Swiss know how to add excitement to a cliff-side trail.
But the Taubenloch trail is nothing to be sceptical about – it turns out that it is a charming, although sometimes alarming stroll. The alarming part is the ample evidence of landslides as can be seen by security tape and warning signs around badly deformed metal railings where the falling boulders have messed with the trail. As late as 2009, the trail was cut off due to a number of landslides. This makes walking it a very exciting venture, indeed.
A southerly portion of the trail scoops out of the limestone walls of the gorge, such that walkers are directly underneath massive overhangs of rock, overhangs that have visible stress fractures in them. It quickens the pulse as well as the pace.
There are gorges and waterfalls more grand to be found south of us in the Swiss Alps, but I am a scaredy-cat, so this was just the right start for me. I’ll try the big stuff later.
To get to the Taubenloch trail,take the train to Frinvillier (less than 10 minutes from Biel/Bienne or 30-40 minutes from Bern, or with train switches, about 90 minutes from Zürich). When you get off the train turn right, heading down to the underpass where you will make another right, going under the underpass that now is an overpass to you, until you come to directional signs in a small Swiss village. Take the sign pointing left (downhill) called Gorges du Taubenloch. It will look like you’re heading off to nowhere, but eventually the road leads to a skinny trail alongside a raised walled canal. This is the northern end. The trail meanders at a
The prospect of this stone ceiling caving in on us did not bother Dave's coworker, Mike.
gentle downhill in a southerly direction, crossing the Suze River several times via walking bridges. At a slow pace, you can cover the trail in 45 to 60 minutes. It is reported to be only two-kilometres long, although with all the winding and such, my pedometer showed it to be much longer.
Cost: We didn’t pay a cent, although as we exited the trail on its south end, we went through a gate, along with some signs in German or French, so it is possible there’s a donation box. The trail is said to be maintained by a non-profit society.
Taubenloch is full of tunnels and caves, some natural, some carved. Locals tell us caves were/are used as potential sniping points in case of invasion, and are also used to stockpile weapons all over Switzerland, which does not have an army per se as the entire male population is required to take military training and serve 3 weeks a year until age 34, although some are required to go til 50 - I would imagine they are 'special-ops.'
One other thing: The southern end of the trail comes out right into a Biel/Bienne suburb, and you can walk all the way back to the train station or look for a bus. I can’t give any advice on the bus, because we walked back home, which took less than an hour, although we did have a leisurely browse through an outlet store along the way. No nature hike is complete without at least one stop in a shop.
Xenophobe’s note: I mock the Spanish for their idea of what constitutes a river, but in all fairness, the Swiss would probably mock me or my fellow Canucks for finding Taubenloch to be awe-inspiring. This is because the Swiss own Switzerland, a pretty fabulous place in every way.
Autumn is a lovely time to walk Taubenloch.
HoboNotes 
Catching up on your Hobo notes today Joanne. Love these photos ( and others you have posted). The trail looks very picturesque and challenging. I bet it was fun to walk it too.
I was interested on your comments on what qualifies as a river. At the back of the property in England where I lived as a small child, was a river. When I went back as an adult, I had to laugh! It was no more than what we would call a creek here.
Another thought on that topic. Recently we watched a series on TV about a group that decided to find the “real” source of the Nile River. After the traditional source on the Blue Nile, is another very small river (creek) that disappears into the jungle. The group hacked their way through the jungle and finally found a little trickle coming from the earth. That is the geological source of the the Nile. It is finally being accepted as that spot now.
It made me appreciate that a river can be that small trickle developing into all those tributaries along the Nile – some very small. And yet, in flood season, the Nile – near the delta and south – can be very wide.
In conclusion, I guess a river is whatever a man decides to call a river 🙂
Keep the good stuff coming,
Thank you!
I agree. It must all be relative to one’s own experience and so if the Spanish want to call a ditch a river, let them. I grew up near Manitoba’s Red River, which always seemed oceanic to me. I default to that as a definitive river, although someone living near the southern reaches of the Mississippi might laugh at me for this.