Bern looks like the most expensive city in Europe and quietly runs on free things. Parliament tours, the rose garden, the botanical garden and the river pool cost nothing, market lunches stay under CHF 12, and the shortest funicular in the country is CHF 1.40.
Terraced hillside park above the Aare loop with 223 rose varieties, 200 iris and 28 rhododendron beds, laid out on a cemetery closed in 1877. The gates never shut, and the benches face the entire medieval skyline with the Alps behind it.
The seat of the Swiss government runs free 60-minute guided tours of both parliament chambers, the domed hall and its mosaic floor. Register online or queue at the visitor entrance on Bundesgasse with a passport; tours pause during sitting weeks.
A chestnut-shaded terrace hanging 30 metres above the Aare on the cathedral's south side, held up by a 1578 stone retaining wall. There is a boules pitch, a drinking fountain and a small pavilion kiosk, all open to anyone without a ticket.
The university's riverside garden below the Lorraine bridge grows roughly 6,000 species across alpine rockeries, a fern ravine and tropical glasshouses. Outdoor grounds and greenhouses are both free, with the houses closing at 17:00.
Tuesday and Saturday morning the market fills the parliament square: Emmental and Gruyère wheels, braided Züpfe bread, Seeland vegetables and filled rolls for a few francs. Stalls start packing up at 12:00 sharp.
A Kornhausplatz institution plating Bernese Rösti, Suure Mocke and sausage with onion sauce at prices the arcade terraces gave up on decades ago. Weekday lunch menus with soup land around CHF 20 in dark wood-panelled rooms.
A covered hall a minute from the station with about fifteen kitchens — Syrian falafel, Peruvian ceviche, Thai curries, Bernese grill — arranged round a central bar. Most plates run CHF 12-18 and the hall stays open late.
The kitchen inside the autonomous Reitschule culture centre under the Lorraine bridge serves a changing daily menu around CHF 15, always with a vegan version, on a graffiti-walled courtyard terrace beside the concert halls.
The funicular lifts you from Wabern to the 858-metre ridge in five minutes. Everything on top — forest trails, the observation tower, public grill pits and the Alpine panorama from Eiger to Mont Blanc — costs nothing once you are up.
Bern's riverside lido on the Aare has charged nothing at the gate since the city opened it in 1782. Four basins, wide lawns, changing rooms and showers, open daily May to September while the river runs green and fast past the fence.
Built in 1885 and originally driven by water ballast, this 105-metre funicular hauls you from the Marzili quarter up to the Bundesterrasse in about 90 seconds — among the shortest public railways in Europe, and still a single fare.
The former estate of Grand Duchess Anna Feodorovna at the far tip of the Aare bend is now an open public park: 200-year-old plane trees, a walled rose collection, a small orangery and meadows running down to the water.