Selke Valley Railway in Harz

Railway station of Alexisbad, Germany

The Selke Valley Railway (Selketalbahn) connects the places Quedlingburg and Hasselfelde/Eisfelder Talmühle with a branch to Harzgerode. It is part of the Harz Narrow Gauge Railways (Harzer Schmalspurbahnen), the largest narrow gauge network in Germany. At my first visit I took a ride from Alexisbad to Gernrode.

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Rail snowplow in Wörgl

Rail snowplow in Wörgl, Austria

Rail snowplow 9981 9592 506-5 seen at railway station Wörgl in the Austrian state of Tyrol.

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Torpedo car in Duisburg

A torpedo car in Landschaftspark Duisburg-Nord, Germay

On my night stroll through the Landschaftspark Duisburg-Nord, an industrial heritage park in the Ruhr area,  I came across this torpedo car. These cars are used for hauling molten pig iron from the blast furnace to the next processing unit.

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High speed trains versus local trains

At the tunnel between Vienna and Sankt Pölten

Today I took the high speed train from Zurich to Budapest passing the new 13 km long tunnel (Wienerwaldtunnel) between Sankt Pölten and Vienna which had been opened the day before. So what was my first impression? Ok, the train was fast but as you can imagine there is nothing to see in such a tunnel. Which brought an interesting question to me…

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Mural in Deutsch-Wagram

Mural in Deutsch-Wagram, Austria

Interesting mural seen at an abandoned building next to the railway station of Deutsch-Wagram. It shows a train dating back to the first days of passenger trains in Austria. On 23rd November 1837 the first steam train of the Austrian empire started to run from Floridsdorf to Deutsch-Wagram.

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