- Hell, Norway
Hell is a
village inStjørdal ,Norway with apopulation of 352. It has become a minortourist attraction because of its name, since people like to take thetrain there to getphotograph ed in front of the station sign. The station sign reads "Gods-expedition", an old spelling of the Norwegian word for "cargo (goods) handling" ("godsekspedisjon" would be the current spelling).The name Hell stems from the
Old Norse word "", which means "overhang", "cliff cave". The Norwegian word "hell" can also mean "luck". The Old Norse word "Hel" is the same as today's English "Hell", and as a proper noun, "Hel" was the ruler of Hel. In modern Norwegian the word forhell is "helvete". The Norwegian word for "God" is "Gud". Among English-speaking tourists, one of those popular Norwegian postcards depicted the station with a heavy frost on the ground. The visual joke was that the picture showed "Hell frozen over", though there was no caption to make the point. Temperatures in Hell can reach -20°C duringwinter .The station itself, Hell Station, is a
railway junction where the rail lineNordlandsbanen north toBodø branches off fromMeråkerbanen betweenTrondheim andStorlien inSweden .
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.