Session #9 Yet Another Look

Session #9  Yet Another Look

With many more pictures and videos to share from our 9th session of the season, I am able to create this next blog entry.

Since our successful session last Saturday, Ottawa was hit by torrential thunderstorms which brought about flooding throughout the city.

We are thinking about our OVGRS members who suffered property damage as a result of these storms.

Now to the trains!  Each week it is this blog's attempt to capture the thrill and excitement of railroading in model form in the great outdoors.

And it is in Fred's backyard where the stage is set.

Every train makes a solid candidate in bringing its operators enjoyment while recreating history as found along the railroad lines of the past.

We spot a business car in Spruce.

And...this baggage car...which will be lifted by the pool train at the other end of Spruce on the temporary house track.

We have already seen in our previous blog entry the completion of the house track where the open track leads in the photo above.

For those lads and lasses who enjoy a wee drink every now and then...we share this image with you!

How about this Pabst Puppy as well!

Interesting engines abound around the railroad.

The flying horse of Mobilgas is a well-known icon in the world of advertising.

While the engine may remain "stealth" the location is not - we're in Cedar Rock here.

Second and third trick trains have yet to depart the midpoint of the railroad as my markers in the dispatch hut indicate.

We credit all those who arrive the property early in order to set out cars to their respective sidings, yards and trains.

Mark and Dilip enjoy the morning's activities pre-ops.

Skipper Henk joins in with a story or two!

Robin certainly is well entertained by Henk!

Felicity and Pat share smiles as well.

And...Bill and Doug crack up with laughter after some choice words Henk offered forth.

Robin, Mark, Sid & Gerry await the pre-ops meeting in the shade near Cedar Rock.

As always, our good buddy Bill 'Sn3' Scobie promotes the narrow gauge operations.

And his shirt's logo does his promotion justice.

Pink styrofoam noodles come in handy to prevent inadvertent head banging on metal.

Paul will be the first to attest to that fact!

Here is one of our two Train Masters who put together the entire operations using the RailOps program.

Thanks for your hard work in organizing the narrow gauge sessions, Steve...and thanks to Dilip for handling our alternate standard gauge sessions!

Nice shirt too, Steve!

Chris relaxes with coffee in hand after setting out a ton of cars.

Doug is the Craig Leigh yardmaster for the session and he has all things under control near the terminal area.

Here's Doug's little Porter steam locomotive.

"Let there be light, Doug!" and there was.

Looking good!

Our other Doug and Henk relax in the chair.  Henk's confused look on his face must mean he is attempting to decipher what someone is telling him.

Bernie and Garry gather for a photo shoot with Mike behind the camera!

Fred takes us through the weekly ritual in the crew lounge before the operations begin.

The lads listen in.  That's our guest visitor, Kris, in the red cap over in the distance and his mentor, crewmate Bernie standing nearby.

Pat is one of our hard-working WDWD crew.

WDWD stands for WorkDay WednesDay.

I've taken the GO train into Toronto from the outlying 'burbs before.  Cool shirt, Pat!

Hmmm...where exactly does the Uintah RR run?

My research tells me that the Uintah Railway was a small 3-ft narrow gauge railroad company in Utah and Colorado connecting the Uintah Basin to the broader railroad network.

The sun shines on Ralph Yard in the early hours of the morning.

Dilip and Moe have reached Ironwood following their derailment along the mainline due to an obstruction reaching across the tracks.

Here's our other Train Master, Dilip!  

Thanks, again, for all you do, Dilip!

Our little diesel friend in CP garb handles the chores here at the moment.

The crew runs around their train in order to handle their facing moves.

Nice job lads!

Bill and Doug are being entertained by Father Fred in the lounge as they await clearance into Ironwood from Spruce.  Sid examines an item while standing close by to Fred.

Seanna controls the power on Passenger 2 through Ironwood.

301 is protected in the siding.

Hot on the tails of Number 2 is 304, now having been cleared into Ironwood at which point 301 will depart.

Video review of the action.

With 304 having taken the siding parallel to 301's track...

...301 will be able to "split the scene"!

And...they do!

301's departure as seen on video.

Thankfully for our passenger and ore runs - there exists a wye in Craig Leigh!

The crew takes to the Northland Ore Dock in order to clear the second leg of the wye.

Then they will back down this leg.

Video effort of their arrival in Craig Leigh.

Seanna now backs the train over to Northland.

Reverse action.

Past the sand tower.

Still more wye video!

The crew takes the far bypass track that will keep the crew out of Douglas Yard.

Their train is spotted passing "Big Tree" at Douglas Yard.

Colourful consists!

Reversing video in Craig Leigh.

Later we find the ore train out from Nelson Yard.

The crew powers through the road crossing.

You can hear the rumble and the roar as the train tackles the grade up to Spruce.

Ore train video.

311 meets 302 at Mercer Siding.

Their tail end passes the locomotive of their cousin's train.

It's onward to Peter's Pond.

A video meet at Mercer Siding.

Another view of two trains who are actually quite far apart from each other.

303 will pull into our western terminus of Firgrove in short order...

...while the caboose on the lower track will achieve our midpoint classification area known as Nelson Yard in mere moments.

Dual train video work.

Our passenger crew find themselves on their second trick of the morning, Train 33.  They have lifted the combine here and will tuck in on the siding for a meet with 312.

312 has been holding at yard limits to the west and is now cleared into Spruce on the main.

The meet is captured in this image.

Number 2 has been cleared to Glen Hammond once the turnout is free.

Another meet video!

33 is underway.

Passing the Spruce depot.

Three trains are captured in this image...Pool Train 33, the Ore Train and 314 in the distance.

The ore train hovers above 314.

Our upper train is aiming for St. Helens while the lower crew has its eyes set on Peter's Pond.

Three train video!

314 arrives Peter's Pond and takes the Cedar Rock siding while 311's crew works the facilities in the lower Pond area.

The lads co-exist and co-operate!

Moe is communicating with dispatch via hand signals...and it works!

Peter's Pond video evidence.

Our ore crew has made Craig Leigh and have taken advantage of the wye to back their cars onto the ore dock.

Bob is an electrical genius and he uses his skills to uncouple his caboose from his train in a remote manner!

Doug arrives to offer an assist.

Craig Leigh video views.

The crew continues with its work here.

Mark follows the progress of his train.

More video work from Mike at this location.

Mark lines up his train for its final backing maneuver.

He observes the action as Bob controls the train.

That's one full ore dock!

Spectacular!

Final ore train video at Craig Leigh.

But...not the final view of the ore train.

My research tells me that the Yellow Pine "Mining" Company was a twelve and a half mile long narrow gauge railroad connecting the town of Goodsprings, Nevada with the Union Pacific RR.  The railroad was built in 1911.

The ore train is too long to capture in this single image so here is the rear section of the train.

Video between St. Helens and Ironwood.

Hauling MT's...the crew proceeds into Ironwood.

She's slowing to a stop.

The crew already in Ironwood has offered the ore train crew the mainline.

Ironwood ore video footage.

Robin walks through the lounge.

Gerry continues his work aboard Train 72 up in Stuart.

There's our good old Drover's Caboose.

302 has planned all their moves down in the Pond as they tackle the many spur sidings up in Cedar Rock.

Kris handles the controls as Bernie decides the moves.

George and Sid take shelter from the sun under the red umbrella found in Firgrove.  Henk and Felicity work Rat Portage in the distance.

Here they are handling the traffic at Hamer Manufacturing.

Love that transfer van on the RP&M!

The Hamer facility is served by the lone "opposing siding" found in Rat Portage.  

This siding offers a greater switching challenge for our RP&M crews.  Before it the siding was there, our RP&M crews consistently completed their work a good half hour or so before their IPP&W counterparts.  The challenge of switching this industry has helped to balance out the operations between the two railroads.

As always, the Firgrove team has its trains made up and ready to rumble!

This image offers us a glance from Firgrove over to the many yards and locations found in the western end of the property.

Garry controls the turnouts at the eastern entrance to Nelson Yard as the ore train departs Glen Hammond.

Two RP&M crews are found down in Rat Portage.

Paul offers valued assistance to Doug in Craig Leigh.

Chris and Gerry hold at the yard limits in Rat Portage after crossing the junction tracks.

Felicity and Henk discus their moves down in Rat.

While he is holding his train outside Rat Portage, Chris shows me the hidden control areas that operate his locomotive.  Cleverly done there Chris!

Taking a little break from our model railroad action...here is a real railroad...the new light rail system being built on the island of Montreal.  

Lisa and I drove there "hyper early" on Monday of this week to pick up our daughters at the bus terminus downtown as they returned from their weeklong trip to New York City and Washington DC.  

The girls originally intended on travelling by train on Amtrak...but, as we heard...the tracks between Montreal and New York City were closed over the "heated rails issue" and the dispute between Amtrak and CN regarding neglected maintenance and reduced speeds.

While I know that Montreal has had some hiccups with their light rail as well, it was interesting to check out the elevated portions along highway 40 as you come into the city.

One of the stations on the West Island.

The tracks cross the main highway.

We travelled down the Decarie Expressway and made our way onto the 136 where we passed the new Children's Hospital, Shriner's Hospital and McGill Health Centre.

From our moving vehicle I only managed to grab a couple of railroad related images...this signal tower along the tracks paralleling the 2-20...

...and this commuter train heading inbound to Montreal on the West Island.  

Yes, Lisa was driving while I was shooting photos!

Check out this painted image of a railroad conductor on the tower near Pincourt, Quebec just off the main island of Montreal.

Back to Fred's place we find him in conversation with Felicity as Paul listens in.

Here's Moe in a bright blue T-Shirt!

The Flying Crow was an actual train on the Kansas City Southern running as Train 15 between Kansas City, Missouri down to Shreveport, Louisianna.  Love the shirt, Moe!

Hey Bernie...that was a fun morning of train ops.  

Thanks for mentoring my buddy, Kris!

Kris has his cap off and is found relaxing in the crew lounge with the lads and lasses.

Henk and Pat share a joke or two.

Bill keeps the lads in stitches as well.

Sid's wife, Jean, has arrived for a lovely visit as she, Doug and Dilip enjoy the noon day sun.

Again, we are thinking of you, Andrew...in the hopes that your flooding problems can be attended to in an expedient manner.  This was the view out my kitchen window into my back yard during the rain storm.

And...the view out my back den window. Yikes!!!

As for me...I've found a shady location for a shady character!!!  😎😎😎

There's no shadiness in this fella's character!

We thank you as always, skipper Fred, for hosting another thrilling ops session in your backyard as we re-create the history of railroading in the steam era.

All the best everyone...Fred and the entire OVGRS clan!

Ottawa, Ontario, Canada