Extraordinary Train Station

Do you use public transport on a regular basis? Then surely, you know exactly when to leave home or any other place in order to just timely catch your bus, tram, train, ferry, whatsoever.

I do. I am usually not a whole lot too early ;0).

This time, though, I had more than enough time. Maybe because we were on a leisure visit in this village, maybe because we had finished our ice cream and coffee anyway. Maybe because it had to be that I entered this passage to the platforms early… For what I got presented with was simply mind-boggling and not something I had ever seen before.

Franck Bouroullec is the artist of this amazing work.

Probably, you know Château-d’Oex from photos of its international balloon festival. But the little village has also become famous as the starting point of the first complete non-stop ballon flight around the globe with which Bertrand Piccard together with Brian Jones set a world record back in 1999.

Their Breitling Orbiter III capsule is therefore displayed in Château-d’Oex beautifully nestled in this Alpine village and right next to a balloon museum, which was unfortunately closed due to Covid-19 measures.

For those of you who want to know some more details about the flight, zoom into the below plates, go to Bertrand Piccard’s account of the journey and to BBC to hear Brian Jones recalling his memories accompanied by inside video footage.

For us, it is high time to come back to the stunning artwork made by Franck Bouroullec in that train station.

You can admire typical Swiss alpine flowers like these edelweiss and gentian.

Or alpine animals:

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In between animals and flowers you will find paintings of Swiss folklore in amazing detail.

Finally, you are heading for a platform and are surprised again.

Look at it for as long as you want, and breathe. Ohm.

© All artwork by Franck Bouroullec and taken as photographs by Lady Bird.