Elephants for show, donkeys for pet, and rivers for jump-in: my last day in Die Schweiz

Matthias left for his weekend hiking trip around 9 this morning, leaving me with Anita and the two beautiful boys to have the day for ourselves. Anita is such a sweet, patient, gentle woman and wonderful host - we did LOTS of stuff today! We began the day by watching elephants march through the streets of Bern. That's right; the oldest circus in Switzerland was in town today (once every year!) so we got to see these incredible, majestic, prehistoric creatures do several tricks right in the middle of the city. There was a huge crowd, but I managed to get a few good pictures, all the while being completely amazed at such giant, yet such gentle-looking, calm animals. The Lord is certainly creative!
After this, we took the "Gurtenbahn" (bahn = train in German, Gurten = the name of the mountain you can see from the Stu(e)rmer's balcony) and spent about 3 hours on top of this lovely mountain where they had a Tahj-Mahal-esque restaurant (where Matthias and Anita had their wedding dinner five years ago!), a tiny train for riding around a kid's play area, with a little stream, a BEAUTIFUL network of short hiking trails (no, I have not gotten enough scenery in Die Schweiz!), and a tower you could climb up in about 45 seconds (even with a 3 year old) to see even more wonderous scenes of the Swiss countryside. Anita even packed a picnic lunch for all of us to enjoy on the mountain!
My favorite part of the whole day, though, was the River Aare. We were on our way from fun in the sun on the Gurten to the petting zoo permanently stationed by the River Aare - this is a really well-run zoo, the animals have HUGE cages and the ones that the kids can pet have ladders going into them so the kids (like Lionel) can actually go into the cages of the animals - the goats, donkeys, horses, etc. As we were walking from the bus to the petting zoo, Anita was explaining to me about how people very often swim in this beautiful, clean river - and they jump from a bridge! Well, I just HAD to try this, seeing as it's not a very common thing, I don't think, and it's one thing everyone does in Bern. The current is fast, the water is cold, I wear glasses (and can't see without them) and...I didn't have my swimsuit. So, I got used to the water a bit on the shore, then, took off my glasses and my pants (I left my shirt on, my underwear covers more of me than some girls' suits I saw, and looks like it could be a swimsuit), and then, jumped from that bridge about 15 feet up in the chilling river with my glasses in my hand so I could put them on to see the shore. The current was fast and strong; to get out, you had to stay to the left bank and try to grab onto a red railing and pull yourself out - HARD. Anita did have a towel from the picnic, so I got out of the water, took off my soaking wet shirt (and put on my zip-up fleece) and wrapped a towel around me. If I did the Celsius-to-Fahrenheit coversion correctly, it was about 90 degrees, so everything dried really fast.
After the petting zoo, Anita took us to the new West Side shopping mall, built in a poorer area of town to "fix it up" a bit. We had dinner at the cafe there, and I got to help take care of Kai, I played with him, fed him a bit and let him climb around. (In the process I lost one of my favorite earrings...hopefully I can find some like it some time...). I then went to a German bookstore and tried to figure out what was going on there. I learned some more words: literatur = literature, herz = heart, and gedichte=poetry.
It was a lovely day - I am SO blessed to have stayed with such a lovely, wonderful family. This is the first time on this trip that I haven't felt like I "just wanted to go home" and the first time that I've felt that I didn't want to leave. Switzerland has really done me some good, the Stu(e)rmer's have, too. They are incredibly, inspiring people who really show me the face of God (which is REALLY needed right now in case you are wondering how to pray for me).
Oh, that and safe travels. Tomorrow I leave with my 15-pounds-over-the-limit suitcase (no, it's not because I've bought so much stuff here, it's because I've BROUGHT too much stuff here!) to Scotland for the last part of my trip: Edinburgh for a week, and then hopping a train to meet my SPU crew in Oban! I can't believe I've only got two and a half weeks left before the craziness of summer school, finding a house, work, school and church all on-slought.