Taking train up northwest, after about 1.5 hours, we arrived at a place called Hoek van Holland (cornor of holland), where  the final masterpiece of the Delta-works has been realised. In the event of threatened storm surge two gigantic white door-sections close off the Nieuwe Waterweg (the river leading to Rotterdam Harbour). 

Het Keringhuis  (www.keringhuis.nl) situated next to the Maeslantkering on the Nieuwe Waterweg. It is administered by Netherlands's water regulating organisation and held an educational exhibition to answer all questions about protecting the area around Rooterdam against high water levels.

In the exhibition, you can
-open and close an iniature storm surge barrier (which is really amazing);
-see an ages old canoe/drainage;
-do a computer quiz about the causes of the rising of the water (my score 5/7 );
-see miniature people coping with high water in the polder and rivers (They use an miniature setting with superimposed vitual figures to immitate when river floods. It makes the people so much more real than doll).

The storm surge barrier

 

Huge sea ship coming from Atlantic Ocean into Rotterdam Harbour

 

Holland family in the 50's

 

Even at the cornor of Holland, there is still Chinese restaurant.

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On the way back, we visited Rotterdam, the second largest city in NL and busiest harbour in Europe.  它让我想起前不久还积压在这里的中国纺织品。如果不是中欧纺织品谈判已经解决了那批货物的问题，没准我还能看到那些集装箱呢。

The city of Rotterdam is not very big. From the central station, there is a walking tour that takes about 2 hours to see the entire city centre. Since we missed the last Rotterdam Harbour tour, we decided to walk around the city on foot.  

Rotterdam City Hall (left) and Unilever Office Building near Train Station

 

Later, We sat at an Indonesian food outlet To Go and  had an almost chinese dinner with rice and soup. For such a decent meal, I am surprised that it only costs 4-5 euro per person.

One thing I notice about Rotterdam is that there is no bus, but only tram (有轨电车). and another interesting transportation tool is Modern Rackshaw.  

 

I was also fansinated by an openable bridge on a river (Later I found out most bridges in NL are openable). When a giant piece of the steel bridge rised upwards to let a small sail boat passing by, I really wondered how much energy is costed and how much the boat owner needs to pay for this service. The entire process takes more than 15 minutes and there were already quite some pedestrains and cyclists waiting to cross. When one of them see us leaving , he must think we are too impatient to wait for the bridge to close, so he shouted at us: "Hi, don't go! it is about to open".  Guus and me burst into laughter on the spot because we have just crossed the bridge, only stopped to see how it works.

in front of the quite famous Erasmus bridge.

 

Totally opened bridge with Sailing boat passing through

17507|food|Netherland|travel