Lights

At Groningen Central Station.

Upon arrival..

..at Groningen Central Station.

Keuruu railway station

There, at the left side of the door, is the railway clock that I showed you yesterday. We were in the town of Keuruu, located about 60 km from Jyväskylä in central Finland, to visit the Keuruu Old Church -more about that later.

'Rautatieasema' means 'railway station'. The building had so many elegant and fine details around the windows.

And the other side.

Train station clock

Tomorrow I´ll show you from which railway station this clock was.

Mist fountain

I have showed you pictures from this artwork a while ago, but then the mist fountain wasn't operative yet. These seven meter high children's heads are the first thing you see when you leave the Leeuwarden train station. They were made by Spanish sculpturor Jaume Plensa (1955); he named it 'LOVE'.

A view from the other side with the train station in the background. As for the 'fountain', I think the effect that the mist gives is a bit minimal. When I passed it in the afternoon there was quite a lot of wind which made the mist hardly visible anymore. On the other hand, it's a nice and original work of art.

Work in progress

The train station area in Assen has been a building site since 2016, but it is all going to be finished later this year. This photo was taken from the temporary bridge that takes train passengers to the other platforms...

...and this is the new roof construction from underneath.

Train station

A photo taken through the (not so clean) train window during a stop in Assen; a bit of a quiet moment in the end of the afternoon.

Groningen CS

View towards Groningen Central Station seen from the Emma viaduct.

Delft railway station

We visited the beautiful historical city of Delft today; Delft is located between the cities of The Hague and Rotterdam. It has a new railway station that opened in 2015 and which was designed by Mecanoo, an international architecture firm that originated in Delft. On the photo is the main hall, the stairs lead to the underground platforms.

Waiting

Utrecht Central Station: the view from my side of the platform as I was waiting on my train yesterday afternoon.

Train travel and reading

 "Lekker lezen doe je in de trein" ("Comfortably reading in the train") is a campaign of the Dutch Railways (NS) with which they hope to encourage and inspire travelers to read in the train. Train travel and reading just go hand-in-hand, they say, and I think that's very true! They are also known to support a number of important and well-known Dutch reading and literacy campaigns.
This was the train that took us from The Hague to Zwolle, Saturday a few weeks ago.

 Near the doors of the train part of a page of several books were displayed, like here from Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert.
I´m not sure though if this would be the book I´d choose to read in the train, a thriller or detective is more my thing..  How about you?

Inside Den Haag Centraal railway station

Isn´t this view, standing inside the new The Hague railway station, magnificent? The glass roof construction contains 220 diamant-shaped windows sized 12x8 metres (39.4x26.2 ft) each, and from what I found on the internet in The Hague they are commonly referred to as "wybertjes".

Outside Den Haag Centraal railway station

Arriving at "Den Haag Centraal". The brand-new main railway station of The Hague opened in February of this year after almost 5 years of renovation works. The original train station dates from 1870, it was called 'Den Haag Rhijnspoor'. Many things have changed since then!

Lots of glass on all sides, which makes it possible to look right through to the sky and see the sun reflect. Tomorrow I'll show you a photo taken inside.

I'm linking to Skywatch Friday and Weekend Reflections.

Lines

This photo was taken at the train station in Workum last Saturday afternoon. Bright sun at that time. Sunday and today however it seems Winter has come back; we have had hail and sleet snow, and when I drove home at 5 pm this afternoon the outside temperature had dropped to 1°C (33,8°F)! Radio-traffic information warned for slippery roads as accidents happened already.
Huh?

I'm linking to Seasons on St Germain's blog.

Harrekrammele

Another fun exhibition currently in the Leeuwarden Fries Museum is 'Harrekrammele', with works from Frisian artist Machiel Braaksma. He uses existing objects for his new creations and assemblages. Harrekrammele is an illustrated storybook in Frisian and Chinese for adults and children. The exhibition displays the book and some of the models he made for this project.
Note that the locomotive is created from an iron!

The train station 'Harrekrammele' is made from cardboard, with crackers as folding-doors...

.. and on the station platform a family is waiting in line..

More about the exhibition and the meaning of the word Harrekrammele HERE.

Antwerp Central waiting room hall

Following up on yesterday´s post these are 2 more views from Antwerp Central Station, taken from inside the waiting room hall which is gigantic! Above is the clock at the upper level.

And this is the impressive entrance hall.

I am taking a blogging-break, see you in October. Stay well!

Antwerp Central

Definitely not to miss during a stay in Antwerp is a visit to the main railway station, even if you don't arrive by train. The original station building was constructed between 1895 and 1905.

During a reconstruction between 1998 and 2007 the station was transformed from a terminus to a through station. This allows high-speed trains to travel through Antwerp Central without the need to turn around. The station is now widely regarded as the finest example of railway architecture in Belgium.
I'll show you some more photos tomorrow.

Friday afternoon

Arriving at Groningen Central Station.

Haren train station

Only 6 minutes from Groningen Central Station is this small train station in Haren. Each half hour you can hop on a train here, heading north for Groningen, or you can travel south to the city of Zwolle.

Groningen Central Station

Seen from across the water of the Zuiderhaven. On the right is the white horse sculpture ('t Peerd van ome Loeks) that I showed you earlier this week.