Next up was a decamp to the other side of the continental divide and I started near Bellemont, not many photos from round here and you have to trek or work the scenery to get it to play nicely. One other downside is that it's not somewhere the crews often see photographers and every pass was met with horns and bells and the odd wave. At the more common spots they just wave as they're comfortable your a spotter.
First up a EB starts the real hard climb up to Riordan which is the summit about 3 miles away.
I just cannot emphasize how steep this transition is, not that the flatter part is flat, just less steep!
This was followed closely by a WB in full dynamic brake.
Already the brake is smoking heavily and there's another 70 odd miles to go down hill from 7000' to about 400' ASL.
Behind me is a large S curve and the photos I took were into the sun and not too clever. so I will go back and redo them at some point later in the afternoon, but, a quick half mile drive gets you to the top of the short stiff grade and S curve.
Again I just cannot convey how steep this section is, I'll have to look at the ATSF track charts I have and see how steep it really is, anyway a EB is going fine, making about 30 mph at this stage and the track levels out a bit ready for the final big push up to the summit.
By the time the DPU passes the train is fully on the hill and has slowed to a crawl.
You can see the start of the next big climb in the back ground.
Moving further East up to near where that bush is in the last photo you get them cresting the rise and onto the less severe stretch.
Nice SD70ACe leader on this train, turning around we have a meet as a WB slips down the grade.
Finally one last WB sliding down the grade, speed picks up real fast here and is limited to 65 down hill from here and they soon get up to that speed.
Moving further East back toward Flagstaff we come to the other side of the divide near I40, another obligatory photo site but a nice one none the less.
Another WB crawls up the hill toward the summit less than half mile behind me. I've never seen any shots from that hill behind the engine looking back up the hill toward the summit in the morning spot that's a definite for me to pick off as it'll be a new angle. It'll be a small window first thing, the sun will be on the nose all morning but might be on the back flank except for a short while just after sun up, I'll have to see.
Moving back to the Route 66 bridge a EB now back lit rolls down grade.
Followed closely by three WB, same area just slightly different angles.
The bridge one has had to be cropped a bit on the left, the pillars have some particularly distasteful graffiti which I'll photo edit out on the full image. The bridge has sloped areas where to can climb up underneath, handy if it's raining! But standing under there when one if these goes by at 5mph is astounding, the noise and reverb is deafening.
Last but no least I went for a walk into the distance in the last shots and around the bend, there's a nice area quite well closed in with scenery for some good shots and I grabbed this WB really flying up the hill on a Z train and bang road too which means he was swapped over to probably pass the previous slow moving stackers.
Both tracks on Transcon2, certainly around here, are Bi-Di signaled and it's not uncommon for them to pass slower trains with priority Z trains, even racing up the hill side by side.
Ok that's enough for one day, time to work out tomorrows sites, couple of quick revisits from today and then onto some now ones, might work more westward toward Williams junction and Maine crossover, maybe pick up Pica and Yampai summit, yes I know, another summit going downhill? but it's a small blip on the downward side, well more than a blip!
Finally, these are all processed on the lap top so contrast and saturation levels etc might be a bit off, I seem to recall my Florida ones were not as good as if they had been done on the big tower PC and large screen, mind I think that's now beginning to dull so a new screen might be in order soon.
Enjoy
so long as it's not caked in mud it's hard for them to prove. I've checked all my photo sites and only three are not near a paved road, god bless Route 66!
We we flew into Denver and I broke the hire car within a day the exhaust manifold recirculation system blew and it sounded like a tractor. I just might of neglected to mention that I'd driven it up to 14,115ft (Pikes Peak) in those days the top half was still gravel track. They replaced it with an "SUV", but that was a GMC Jimmy and to be honest that was the biggest piece of crap I've ever driven and I had an old rear engine Skoda 120L in the dim and distant past!!
with the locomotive allocations so far. Personally I'd be missing my EMD's already.
