Second page of my Algoma Central Tour of the Line 1977

Second page of my Algoma Central Tour of the Line 1977
My second page of the Tour of the Line 1977

There were lakeside stops every ten miles or so.
Some were no more than a gravel road with a pick-up truck waiting. This is flag-stop country.
The train would make a quick stop, dozens of boxes of groceries and half a dozen cases of the local Sault beer were handed down, and two canoes, and then away the train would go.

A float plane. I don't know how much of the color loss of my slides is from age and how much might be from tinted windows.

Newaygo Timber Company siding

Oba, where the Canadian Northern crosses east - west

My first view of a Canadian crew cab, in 1977. Of course, since then I have been many of them.

And I was a little surprised at the last 5 miles going in to Hearst,
it's farm land, or at least no forests.

Hearst Junction, where the AC ends and travels for a mile on the CN to the depot in Hearst.

Tree-length logs

I would guess about 60 people got off at the small lake side towns and flag stop areas, a few at some places, and up to a dozen at others.
About 15 went all the way to Hearst.

From the station in Hearst, we were cabbed to the Northern Lights hotel,
which was 2 blocks from the tracks. I was on a railfan trip, and wanted to see trains from my room, so I went back to the Queens Hotel by the CN tracks and got a trackside 2nd floor room.
But I think only one CN train went through during the night.

Here's the slash burner of the local sawmill at 5am, and I took the picture not because I like slash,
but because the sky was so much brighter than I expected for this time of the morning.
That's what happens from traveling 300 miles north, getting closer to the Arctic circle in Summer.

I knew I was a long ways in to Canada when I went to a restaurant and everyone was speaking French.
The menu was in French.

Our train was parked somewhere near the CN yard overnight
and it came back to the depot platform in the morning.

There's two locomotives today.

Hooray, a crisp slide that's not taken through a window.
I put the camera on a pile of lumber and flipped the self timer lever
(its a mechanical clock mechanism)
That's me on the right, young, with lots of hair on my head.

'In the tracks of the Black Bear' is on the side of many of the passenger cars.

They back the train up to Hearst Junction, and then take the wye south to get on their own tracks.
I had a big advantage traveling both ways; I made notes on the way north when I missed filming things, and that gave me a heads-up for the return trip, so I knew whcih side of the car to sit on to get ready to take pictures.
I was in the last car, and could see out the rear window, too. But there was a sign to not ride in the vestibule, so I didn't stay there long. But it was great looking directly down the tracks.
Near the end of the return trip, the conductor saw I was taking pictures through a wet hazy window, so then he took me to the vestibule and opened the door window and said please enjoy the better view of the scenery. .
Wood Chip mill

They load the big green high-side gons here, and many of them (in those years) went to Neenah, Wisconsin, papermills. I have also seen those cars off loaded in Whiting, Wisconsin.

The crossing at Oba

fisherman in a boat near the trestle.

See the timetable board at Franz. You could transfer to the Canadian Pacific.

50.

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This page was filmed in July, 1977 and wrote about in July, 2021