A friend of mine and I are embarking in the near future on an annual train watching trip, and will be visiting the Folkston, GA area for a long weekend.
If anyone has any suggestions for good spots in that area, and perhaps within an hour or two radius, would love to hear. Also, any restaurants or bars that provide a good view of the tracks are appreciated.
Many thanks in advance.
They have a train watching pavilion there. There are also places to eat & sleep. I saw like 25 trains in like 8 hours of watching back in 06. Besides A/trak I also caught the OJ train.
Two hours - eight trains. An excellent watching location. I encountered a ‘regular’ there who pretty much knew the routine.
For sunny day photography I recommend morning to early afternoon, since the platform is on the east side of the tracks. There is open space and a fairly quiet street on the west side, too, but you lose the radios in the platform as a resource.
Up 301 a few miles is Jesup, also home of a railwatching platform. I haven’t been there, though, so can’t speak to the traffic.
I was there from approximately 11:00 AM to 3:00 PM. Don’t remember how many trains passed, but there were several. There was a midday lull of about 2 hours with no trains, which a couple of regulars said was about normal. The platform was stocked with old Railway Age and Trains mags, which helped pass the time. Don’t think there are any restaurants with a view of the tracks. Probably aren’t any bars - they aren’t common in small towns in that area, and many counties in that part of the world are either totally dry or beer and wine are the only things sold, and no bars (don’t know the status of the county where Folkston is located).
Haven’t been to the train-watching platform in Jesup, but would imagine there are fewer trains. Folkston catches everything on CSX headed to FL, and Jesup only gets the CSX traffic on the Jesup cutoff to bypass Waycross between Savannah and Jacksonville. My understanding is that the Jesup platform isn’t far from where NS’s line from Macon to Brunswick crosses CSX, but there isn’t much traffic on NS (probably one train each way each day, maybe fewer). Don’t know if the Jesup platform is even within seeing distance of the NS line.
I believe Jesup is about 45 miles north of Folkston. Traffic shouldn’t be a problem even though U.S. 301 is two-lane - I went thru Jesup to get to Folkston, and much of the time mine was the only car as far as I could see in either direction.
CSX has a railyard in Waycross… and while your in Waycross, check out the Okefenokee Swamp just south of town on US1. They do have a steam train that runs around the swamp and you can see more critters that will kill you than you knew existed. I grew up about 50 miles from Folkston and there is a whole lot of nothing in South Georgia
I visited Folkston last March on our return trip from Florida. I went in to the tourist office which is housed in the former ACL station to find out where the train viewing platform was, and I asked the receptionist how busy the line was, and she told me it had been busy. The train watching platform is off Main Street and a left turn down a dirt road immediately to the east of the tracks.The area around the ex ACL station in Folkston around the Main Street grade crossing is a good location for photographing trains in the afternoon.
We visited Folkston late in the afternoon, and we only had to wait 10 minutes before a southbound unit coal train came. We didn’t wait for any more trains after I photographed that one train because it started to rain again, and we wanted to get on to Brunswick, GA where we spent the night. We planned to visit Jessup, GA the following day, but the weather was bad.
Folkston has some chain fast food restaurants, but a better selection of restaurants or lodging is in either Brunswick, GA or in Jacksonville, FL. You will need a car to reach Folkston, and I agree the highways in to and out of Folkston are not busy.
Thank you everyone–great information.
(Although I’m not sure I want to see more critters that will kill me than I knew existed!)
Here are my pix from my trip to Folkston
Your photos are making me home sick… Guess I do need to get some boiled peanuts and some good BBQ
Sorry certainly did not post them to get U home sick.