I will be visiting Cathedral City and Palm Springs area this winter. Does anyone know of any good hobby shops, MR clubs, or railfanning locations in this area. I can’t golf all the time, you know!
Thanks!
Not sure about hobby shops, besides golfing all the time isn’t a bad thing! The San Berdo SF Station is pretty slick.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Fe_Depot_(San_Bernardino)
You can drive a real train in Perris, Cool train stores in Culver City"Allied", Burbank"The Train Shack", and Pasadena “Whistle Stop”. Don’t know of anything that far south though.
There is a club in Indio nearby called the http://www.cvmrr.com/, no train shops in that valley as far as I know. Another good destination is http://www.livingdesert.org/ for learning about the desert and there is a substantion garden railway there.
The Perris museum is about 1 hour and 15 minutes west. The San Bernardino Sante Fe depot is also about the same amount of drive time but is only open 9-2 on Saturdays I think. The UP(SP) Colton yard is also nearby and Cajon Pass is a popular spot to about 30 minutes north of the depot.
I don’t know how long you will be here but the socal yahoo group has self guided tours that you may be interested in also. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Model_Railroads_Of_Southern_California/
Allied trains is about 2 hours and the Original Whistle stop could be as much as 3 hours because of trafic.
I am in Riverside about 20 minutes south of the San Bernardino depot and 30 minutes west of the Perris museum and I am always open to visitors.
Any more questions about this area just let me know. I will answer the best I can.
If you can get to San Diego, you must visit the Model Railroad Museum in Balboa Park which is next to the Zoo. The displays are world class and I say this after traveling every continent in the world except Antarctica. Peter Smith, Memphis
I agree if you have an entire day you could dedicate to it. There are a couple good shops to.