A Weird Way I Learn

 I watch train videos. I mean, like cameras set up in the cab of trains and record the train's going down the track. I really have no reason to do such a thing but I do see some interesting things. I think it calms me in a way. I mean, in my cube at work I had three monitors and one of them was running a train video off Youtube, unless I needed it for coding purposes. I would get the random person walk by and notice it and ask me what it was. (Hmmm, maybe I used it for a conversation starter too.) Back in 2019, I was riding the rails across Russia, doing the whole Trans-Siberian Railroad. Dang, I learned a lot from that. Anyway, this is another story.

So lately, I've been riding the railroad in Southern France. I don't know why that struck me as interesting but there I was, noticing what that part of that country was like. It was gorgeous. So anyway, I'm tooling around and if I see anything interesting, I go to maps and see if I can find it. In the early part of the video of this particular train ride, I noticed water along the side of the tracks. I figured it was a canal of some sort, as I've done plenty of bike rides along canals here in Illinois. I didn't think too much of it. It didn't even spike interest for me to look it up on the map or even the history. 

BTW, later in that train ride it goes on the high-speed rail section to Paris. 320 kph! That is impressive. I also looked up the TVG network and how they connect to cities, as at that speed, you don't go through city centers. Dang impressive what they did there.

Anyway, along comes a couple videos from The Tim Traveler. I love this guy. ,He seeks out strange little facts about places and I enjoy his work. This time, he talked about a canal, in Southern France. Hey, I've seen one of those. This was about a canal that had a large number of locks in an area and a guy wanting to see if he could make that an easier transition. 

Here it is on Google Maps.

While it took me a bit to understand what this was, I was also fascinated that the canal that I saw in the train video was part of a system that connected the Atlantic to the Mediterranean. Fascinating, I didn't know anything like that existed. I don't think it is in use now, but wow, 

A little while later, he posted another one of these beasts.

Here that one is on Google Maps.

I think it is kind of ingenious. Making a moving canal to take boats up a slope. And the second video explains it better. 

I learned a lot about France by paying attention to some online people and checking things out on a map. I don't think I'll ever get there in my lifetime, but I do feel smarter by watching these things.

Some more weirdness: