On Saturday, April 4, volunteers Ron, Teia, Dianne, Michael, John, Dwight, Reid, Kendall, Bruce, Nick (#1), Ben, Nick (#2), Colin, Jared, Sandra, Gabriel, Dannis and Paul gathered to get our trains out and operate some rides for our guests for Easter. Everyone worked hard to get the train ready to roll, and we boarded our first guests and headed out of the Depot to the end of the line. On the return leg, Engine 102 and our track had a disagreement, and a slight derailment was the result of some track with too-wide gauge. This mishap abruptly ended our rides in the first half hour. After a quick look at the situation, it was determined that we could get the wheels back on the track with a little help from some tie plates. The unknown was whether we could prop up the track well enough to keep operating. Reid, Bruce, both Nicks, Ben, Colin, Jared, Dannis and Paul jumped in and gathered the tools needed to make the repair. We borrowed a couple of gauge rods from another area of our track, and reset some spikes to set the correct gauge, and after two hours we ran over the track for a quick test.

With everything back on the track, the crew got back to the Depot platforms and loaded up some passengers for a ride. Some guests had waited until the repairs were done to get their ride, and we had a decent turnout of about 110 riders for the last couple of hours, including an extra hour we worked to make up for some of the time lost earlier.

Today was a great example of what our team of volunteers does at the Museum regularly to keep the operation going. Now we have to plan the next round of tie replacement on our track!

Nearly all of the pictures this time feature the track repair action. In addition to my pictures, Bruce and Ben pitched in with some of their own.

– Paul

Photos by Paul, Bruce and Ben