3 Best Sights in Meiringen, Berner Oberland

You can explore the imposing Aare Gorge (Aareschlucht, as it's known in German) via a sturdy walkway. On hot summer days, the rush of river water below you has a welcome cooling effect.

Meiringen's one showstopper is the Reichenbachfälle, where Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's fictional detective Sherlock Holmes and his archenemy, Professor Moriarty, plunged into the "cauldron of swirling water and seething foam in that bottomless abyss above Meiringen." This was the climax of the "last" Holmes story, "The Final Problem" (the uproar over the detective's untimely end was such that the author was forced to resurrect his hero for further fictional adventures). The falls, 2,730 feet up a mountain a little way outside of town, can be visited via a funicular. Buy your funicular ticket online or from the driver (cash only).

Fans of the famous detective will like the Sherlock Holmes Museum in the center of town. Housed in a small chapel, it contains a replica of the fictional sleuth's front room at 221B Baker Street.