Good Morning to you all. The following is a synopsis of my adventures over the weekend with #844, and her supporting cast members. It’s probably long and rather boring, and includes several rants, but there is a little eye candy so it may be worth your while.
Day One, Thursday:
There’s not much to tell here, other than the fact that I saw 844 and 3985 down at Union Station. I wasn’t able to nab any pictures at that time, but it was good to see them, especially #844. It certainly primed my chase pump for the rest of the weekend.
Day Two, Friday:
After work on Friday, I headed on down to Union Station where #844 and #3985 were on public display. This was the first time I’ve ever seen 844 up close and in person. Wow! The UP Steam crew did an AWESOME job on her. She just looked spectacular. I shot some afternoon shots with the D60, and also with a Kodak Brownie Box camera. Bringing out a box camera is sure to attract some attention (though I didn’t mean for it to). One of those I met through the box camera was a gentleman named Paul, who happened to be a member of the Denver O-Scale club that resides in the basement of Union Station.
He took me down to the layout, and showed me around. HOLY COW! That is a monstrous layout. And I just love big O-scale layouts. They can’t be beat for realism. Check out this shot of D&RGW K-27:
OK, so I needed more depth of field…I know. I was already shooting at ISO 400, at f8 for 1/2 sec without a tripod (was braced as best as I could). I’m quite proud of myself, as there is not much detectable motion blur in the full size image. I probably could’ve gone another stop or so, but oh well.
After the layout tour, I headed back up to teh 844, where dusk was setting in. I stayed for quite a while shooting evening/night shots. I have to look at these a little closer, but as of right now, this is my favorite:
Far out Chris,
I wish I could have seen the doubleheader with 844 in that cool black paint (never did like the grey). Of course for reasons I don’t have to explain, I don’t CHASE steam anymore. And if I was an auto insurance provider and I found out one of my clients was planning on chaseing a steam train I would cancel the policy immediately.
Did you find your phone? Our phones have GPS tracking, makes them impossible to loose. Great feature that has paid for itself many times over.
Yup…added an extra 80 miles or something to the trip, bt did find the phone right where I expected it to be. GPS would’ve been nice though…I would’ve really been steamed if it hadn’t been there (bad pun intended).
That reminds me of one time I went on a hike up to Vasques rocks from Soledad Canyon. I did a big figure 8 and on the way back down I spotted a pager hanging of a branch at waist level. I thought to myself some dumb a$$ lost his pager. When I grabbed it and went to clip it on my belt I realised it was MINE!!! It’s a good thing I crossed my path at that point or I never would have found it. What are the odds of that?
Hey copcar do you drive a white ex cop car? I was parked just ahead of the freight holding the siding by Ault. Anyways I saw a white car drive by a couple times that 4
3985 got yanked out of the train at Greeley on Saturday. Nobody fessed up as to “why?” yet.
AS a member of an “Industrial Advisory Committee” for the Surveying Program at Metro, I will add your rant to my list (along with the parking scam and the MIS computer people who need “boiled-in-oil”, shot, drawn and quartered…and then maybe threatened)
3985 was pulled in Ft Lupton Saturday morning. It was an hour long stop. The train never stopped in Greeley. It stopped in Lasalle for about 15 minutes.
I wish I could have made it up Saturday, but the wife and kids thought it better to go to the El Paso county fair (nothin’ fair about that). BTW, who did the easement belong to that runs along 24 northeast of Colorado Springs? Thanks.
My wife is Air Force and we just moved here recently, so I am not quite “up to speed” on everything around here, yet. Interesting to see most of the original bridges in place, especially the wood trestles. Thanks for the intel!!
Not quite as visible at Falcon is the remains of the old Colorado & Southern R/W (D&NO - denver to pueblo abandoned in 1937 along with the branches to the Franceville mine and to Pete Field)…I laid out trackage at Peyton in 1983…What killed the line is still in plain view just behind the warehouse at Constitution & Academy, a bridge washed out cy city negligence. Railroad won the lawsuit in a protracted trial, but by then it was too late - Otherwise the line to Limon might still be there. Go see the Rock Island Roundhouse at Roswell (Steel St, just off I-25 & Fillmore) along with the trolley.[;)]
Unfortunately, I was too busy trying to recompose, and contain my anger. After both of those didn’t work, I settled on watching the special run by, and just enjoy watching two big steamers run. It was worth it, but still would’ve liked the picture. It was a pretty cool shot with the 500mm pulling in the cityscape.
Additionally, I’m not sure I’d want to know who it is. If I found out, I’d be inclined to lay into the guy quite a bit for being dangerously stupid to himself, and giving railfans a bad name. After a good helping of that, I’d probably do it all over again for being the most impolite son of a gun ever. This wasn’t an accident. The photo line was large and well established. He knew where it was, and chose to get in front of them all none-the-less.
I usually don’t carry grudges…but this guy bugs me a whole bunch…
