Solothurn, Switzerland’s foremost baroque city is alive and well, especially on sunny days when everybody flocks to the Aare River. Hares, migratory birds and water fowl in Grenchen’s Witi nature protection zone are enjoying a more or less healthy eco-system of national significance. Be sure to stop in Altreu for a delicious fish dinner. Storks have resettled here in 1948, and in 2008 Altreu was named the “European Stork Village” by the Euronatur Foundation. Every spring the females are laying between two and six eggs in their rooftop nests. Just listen to the noisy clattering of the beautiful birds. The Witi-Altreu information centre (mid-April to mid-October) provides information about the rich nature area on the Aare between Grenchen and Solothurn.

Taking a boat from Solothurn to Biel is a spectacular way to travel: passengers waving on the left and the Jura Mountains with Mount Weissenstein, etc. looming on the right. The covered wooden bridge in Büren an der Aare, built in 1821, had to be rebuilt in 1991 after an arson attack. Part of the so-called “Old Aare” was reserved for the Häftli nature preserve, a branch that cut off the Nidau-Büren channel (built after the correction of the Jura waters) from the Aare’s original course. Following this channel, leaving the bilingual city of Biel behind, will soon take you to Lake Biel. Large vegetable fields and posters advertising vegetables sold directly from the farms are an obvious sign that you are on the way to Switzerland’s vegetable gardens.

The Hagneck hydroelectric power plant, which opened in 2015, is an ecological masterpiece and one of a kind in Switzerland. Here, where the Aare flows through the Aare-Hagneck channel into Lake Biel, the colours where river and lake merge often have a fascinating structure – nature’s work of art, pure and simple. The Mittelland Route continues along Lake Biel to the medieval town of Erlach. Looking across the lake, you will see St. Peter’s Island and the pretty winegrowing villages of Twann and Ligerz. Past the campgrounds and bypassing Erlach‘s Jolimont mountain takes you to the next channel: Zihl channel, connecting Lake Neuchâtel and Lake Biel. And reaching the “Great Marsh” means that you have arrived in Switzerland’s immense vegetable gardens, in Ins where Friedrich Dürrenmatt is said to have written the famous drama “The Visit”.