Trains & trams

Sign saying that the disruption on a certain piece of track is over and that the train service will return to normal.

Sign saying that the disruption on a certain piece of track is over and that the train service will return to normal.

These trains could be coupled so that you could walk from one train to another through the nose. It has costed a lot of money to develop that coupling, but now the trains are no longer coupled in that way. It takes too much time according to the national railways.

These were the first double-decker trains in the Netherlands. Space inside is quite limited.

These trains were introduced in 1964, although they have been refurbished (unfortunately).

The track between Leiden and Utrecht is about the worst in the Netherlands. It is a single track, often disrupted because there is a cow on the line or a signals failure. The trains are often busy to the point of bursting. It used to be a all-station service, but since recently the Dutch railways upgraded it to an intercity (fast train) service. It skips two stations where it used to stop, but it takes longer. There is one good thing about this line: it cuts right across the so-called "green heart" of the Netherlands, so it offers great views of the Dutch countryside and those fabulous skies you can see on the old Dutch masters.

In Dutch trains a little sticker above the door-opening buttons reminds you that you shouldn't open the doors before the train has stopped. In fact you cannot open the doors before the train has stopped, the open button does not function before that. In old trains doors could be opened whilst the train was moving, but those trains have been decommissioned in the 1990s. The stickers remain. Sometimes I think the Dutch Railways has ordered millions of those stickers and that is the reason why they are still used.

On nearly every railway crossing there is a sign warning you that you should not pass when the red light is still flashing, because a train could come from the other direction.

Now used by a GP.

Used (although not much) by the Utrecht tram

Maintenance work of the railroads is usually done at night.

Chicken, mushrooms, pumpkin and rice. Salad with lentels and salmon Chocolate parfait. The chocolate parfait was the best.

Old shot from Brussels-Amsterdam express. The windows were dirty and the Nokia cameraphone isn't that good, but it captures the Belgian atmospere rather well.

Old shot from Brussels-Amsterdam express. The windows were dirty and the Nokia cameraphone isn't that good, but it captures the Belgian atmospere rather well.