Maastricht is my favorite city so far. There is so much history everywhere. We took a train down to southern Holland today. We did another tour of the limestone quarry tunnels. This section was used to shelter about 8,000 people from air raids during WWII though it could house about 40,000 people. No evacuation was officially called so the caves did not get used for very long, about a month. The Romans were the first to start digging the caves in search of limestone and you can still see "graffiti" on the walls; I saw one dating to around 1750. After the tour Antony and I wandered around Maastricht. We found sections of the original city wall constructed in the 13th century! There are also a lot of ornate churches here, this region has a lot Roman Catholic influence.

 These two churches have quite a history. The one of the right was built first but the locals didn't like all the newcomers and pilgrims coming to their church so the one on the left was built. They say that the left is hell, the right is heaven and the street between is actually named purgatory. The red tower is made of limestone but was painted each year by the blood of oxen.

 Original city wall

 This car is tiny!!

 The caves had 5 of these ovens to bake bread during WWII.

 This is an incomplete map of the entire cave system. It is about 200 km long and stretches from southern Holland and through a large portion of Belgium.

 Charcoal drawing of the two churches pictured above.

 They grow these chinucks (??? Ive never heard of these) as well as mushrooms in the caves.

 This cement plant has dug up a lot of the limestone tunnels but if you look through the trees you can see some entrances to the tunnels.

This was the view from our bus stop