"industrial monument" Top 5 Page for this destination Surrounding area Tip by ger4444

Allready at the north of the Maasdal (Maas Valley), in Stein, you can see it shing on the horizon: DSM. Yes, we are now most off the beaten as possible, since here Maastricht Surroundings stop since Maastricht tourist offices do not generally see places like Geleen and Sittard as immediate surrounding. For tourist info on these places check under the names of Sittard and so on. For the South Limburgian tourist district, there is a good co-opration with the tourist offices in Maastricht, Valken burg and Heerlen, they overlap eachother in proviving informations, reservations, in booking hotelrooms (yes, at crowded festivals like the Preuvenemint, it is all booked out as for hotels ot restaurants; so you might find yourself being in a hotel in Heerlen). Many of the regional off the beaten places mentioned in my Maastricht pages are located in this page, since they are yet too small, and therfor not large enough to build many usefull tips about, yet, they should in my eyes be mentioned since they are absolutely interested, especially in case you want to see soemthing new. My list of off the beaten path tips will not be complete without mentioning the DSM, at the border of Sittard-Geleen city. Geleen has grown out to an importat industrial centre. Once here the biggest coalmine of Europe was located. Now the surroundinmg is dominated by a petro-chemical industry DSM. (Dutch State Mines) after the closing of the mines in South-East Limbeurg, it developed as a artifial fertilizer company. Coming/going from Maastricht at the highway to the north you cant escape the look of this factory complex. Here it is clear that we are dealing with a future new monument. Lovers of indart (industrial art) love to have it as object for photografie or artfilms. Indeed, I must admit, already as a little kid I was impressed by the large (kilometres long) complex which in the evening dark is sort of magic by its lights, tubes and towers.