Dorsten is close to Botrop. And Dorsten, like so many places in the Ruhrgebiet (Just over 100 km from Arnhem), has a former coal mine.
That entire Ruhrgebiet has not been a dirty industrial site for a long time, we reported earlier. It is a wonderful park landscape where it is fantastic to enjoy with classical transport.
And because it is so close, a normal weekend is long enough for such an excursion.
The Ruhrgebiet immediately feels like 100% foreign.
All past glory from the really not so glorious industrial coal & steel age is now more or less treasured as a historical heritage.
But that the most recent mine closures date back to the 1980s can be seen in some remains ...
The lifts in the mines were operated from a machine room at a distance from the shaft. And somewhere in the aftermath of this mine, a lift operator must have upgraded his workplace.
The entire rods and pole sets for operating the elevator are authentic and based on steam engines and large rotating and reciprocating things.
But somebody must have missed the seat in his car ...