We had a great weekend running trains and chatting with folks at the County Fair Mall here in Summerside.  As far as I know it was the first time that anything like this has ever been done here.  We certainly increased awareness of the hobby and even dug a few more model railroaders out of the woodwork.  Hopefully a few will join our operating group.

I posted a more detailed report on the Island Rails web site.  Click here to read about it.

Scott

A week ago we had our 3rd annual operating day in Saint John.  Not wanting a repeat of the last few late starts I created a healthy competition to make sure the guys were on time.  Brian and Derwin were actually early!   We were on the road pretty much on time!

We stopped at the local Tim’s/Esso to fuel up.  I did the gas pumping duties while Brian and Derwin went inside.  I got my coffe and we were on our way. We had one stop in Moncton to pick up Jean and Ryan.

The conversation in the car was pretty normal until I mentioned something about Brian paying for the gas (we were using his car).  He said he thought I was paying for the gas (from our group travel fund).  Nope, I didn’t pay for the gas.  It was the first time I ever did a “gas and dash”.  If I had known we were doing it I wouldn’t have been able to.  We had all kinds of thought of “APB’s” and roadblocks set up looking for us.  It didn’t happen and we did settle the bill after we got back.

Anyway, we picked up Jean and Ryan and made it to Doug’s place by 10:30.  Besides Doug we were joined by a couple of N-scalers that wanted to play trains with the big boys – Lawrence and Mark performed duties that required knowledge of the layout, like dispatching and yard work.  It was Jean’s first time there so he was happy to partner with me for the first couple of jobs.  We drew the daily container train from Dever Road Yard to McAdam for our first train.  It was a great way to see the whole layout at a leisurely pace.  Although, Doug did come around shortly after we left Dever Road and made an off-hand comment referring to our lack of speed and the profitability of the railroad – so we moved a little faster after that.

Our second train was a wayfreight so we had a little more work to do than with our first one.  There was something to do at just about every stop.

Derwin got lucky and drew a track maintenance job – just a loco and a rail cleaning car.  He didn’t get to do a lot of switching, but he did watch a lot of trains go by while he was thawing out frozen point rails and cleaning flanges.

At some point Derwin must have got tired of every one else doning something profitable and he finished up his maintenance job.  He and Ryan then took a train out of McAdam bound for Saint John.

I’m sure Brian ran something there, but I’ll be darned if I can remember now.

About 1:00 we decided it was time for lunch and a stop at the train store before heading to Steve’s.  We found the train store easy enough and spent only a little bit of money.  I picked up a CP 1/2 ton truck,  some Woodland Scenics people, and a couple other odds and ends that you’ll see photos of over time.

Then we unleashed ourselves on Steve’s “Carleton Railway”.  He had no idea what kind of havoc we would bring.  Jean and I ran the local switchjob in South Newbridge.  The task was to pull cars from the local indistries, sort them onto the departure tracks, put the on the approriate train through town.  It seemed easy enough so we got down to business.

Brian was running the first train into town.  Since he was heading west we gave him all the west bound cars in South Newbridge and gave him a push up the hill.  We thought it was really cool to have long main line runs to make long trains look good!  Next train through was Ryan heading east so we did the same with our waiting east bound cars.  We were done, except for a few cars to put away.

Eventually Steve figured out why we were done so quick and why Ryan’s and Brian’s trains were so long.  We weren’t supposed to give them everything we had – only certain cars (empties I think).  The other cars were supposed to go on trains that would come through town later.  I guess we should have read the instructions so conveniently posted on the fascia.  Oops!  It really was Derwin’s fault, but I haven’t figured out a good way to explain it yet.

We had supper at Steve’s and after supper we finished up the rest of the work and left for home about 7:00.

We always have a lot of fun when we visit Doug and Steve.  We really appreciate their hospitality and calmness when we screw up!  HA!

Thanks guys!

Scott

That’s right, after 2 previous attempts that failed for one reason or another, we finally made it to Moncton yesterday for a day filled with model railroad operations, and 1 trip to the local train store.

We arrived at John’s  a little before our allotted time of 10:00, which was better than the 40 minutes early the Moncton guys were the last time they came to the Island.  Anyway, we chatted for a bit, looked around to see what was new and then Jim made a surprise announcement…

Derwin won an honorary Golden Demerit Award!  Being a past winner of this prestigious award himself, Jim was very happy to present the very first G.D. Award to someone outside of their operating group.  Derwin seemed very pleased to receive the award.  I’m sure it is already framed and hanging on the wall in his train room.

It’s hard to read the text in this close up.  Hopefully Derwin will provide the full text on his blog.

Once the ceremony was out of the way and congratulations were given, it was time to start operating.  Derwin was in the operator’s chair running the yard (a position that may become familiar in upcoming photos), Brian ran several trains, and I worked the local switching job in Riverview.  Now I’m not sure at what point things got out of control, but while I was working extremely hard I noticed this out of the corner of my eye…

Well, when the layout owner got wind of what the new guys were up to he blew his top!  You should have heard the language that was used!  Those guys were really in trouble!

Well, even after all of this, John still fed us lunch.  I thought I had made myself clear last week when I was told what was on the menu.  Derwin can not eat anything with beans, spice, or food in it.  The after-effects can be deadly.  We joked about how fast we’d get home with the back seat down and the trunk open.  Seriously, we made the 2 hour trip in 45 minutes!

After lunch we were off to Don’s HO for some bargain hunting and Christmas shopping.  Boy, am I going to be surprised Christmas morning with what I think I bought for my wife to give to me. (huh?)

Then it was over to Dave’s for some more operating fun and hijinks.  Jim worked in Baltimore.  I heard him comment many times that Baltimore never ran so smoothly, or looked as well organized.  I’m pretty sure the layout owner ignored most of those comments.

Meanwhile I worked the yard job.  I noticed a lot of cars returning from Baltimore that should have stayed and been spotted at industries there.  I guess Jim discovered that traffic in = traffic out is an efficient way to keep things looking tidy.

Everyone is reading their cards trying to figure out what they have to do.  I’m pretty sure Jim is putting on an act since he obviously just took the cards for the in-bounds and gave them to the guy running the out-bound train.

John ran the local switching job in <insert town here>.  Brian ran several trains to and from various towns on the layout.

I think Dave finally started cluing in to what Jim was doing in Baltimore to keep things tidy.  Of course, it didn’t hurt that I told him.

This seemed to be a common sight.  Everyone working hard keeping freight moving on the layout and Derwin in his common position.

This was one of the first layouts I’ve operated on where steam equipment  was as prevalent as diesel.  John is leaving the yard with his train using a small steam locomotive.  Previously we saw a double headed steam consist leaving the yard bound for parts unknown (Saint John maybe?).

Anyway, that’s the end of the photo tour of our operating day in Moncton.  We had a great time and can’t wait to do it again.  Next it is their turn to come to the Island.  Hopefully by then we’ll have one more layout to operate on.

Time to go for now!

Scott