Some railway stations feel less like places and more like scenes from another age. Simeria, in western Romania, was one of them.
This photograph was taken at dawn during my journey aboard the Dacia Express from Budapest to Bucharest. The train had paused quietly along the foothills of the Carpathians while the first light of morning spread across the station platforms. The aging railway buildings, empty tracks, and soft golden sky felt almost unreal, as if the train had drifted briefly into a phantom story land somewhere between night and day.
There is a certain romance to overnight trains that is difficult to describe. You fall asleep in one world and wake up in another, carried through mountains, valleys, and forgotten stations while most of the continent still sleeps. The Dacia Express embodied that feeling perfectly.
What lasted only a few minutes from the train window became one of the defining images of the journey for me. That is why this photograph earned a permanent place on my wall; not because Simeria was a famous destination, but because it captured the atmosphere of the journey itself: quiet, nostalgic, and timeless.
A full video blog of this journey can be seen on my YouTube channel at the link below.