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The Return to Baltimore 7/5/2003

The signal system had been hit by the lightning, delaying our 3:00 PM departure until 3:40 PM when we revesed out of the Harrisburg station to the east end of the yard where we stopped next to the eastbound Amtrak Three Rivers, which had been waiting for us to clear. After a switch was thrown, the Three Rivers stopped at the station then at 4:08 PM, we proceeded east, stopping to align a switch to enter the Norfolk Southern freight bypass line behind the station, so my new mileage started here. We were riding on the tracks that I have always travelled on Amtrak until now then we went through Steelton with the Susquehanna River to our right before going through Highspire then underneath the Pennsylvania Turnpike, prior to going under the flyover of the Amtrak-owned lines before passing Harrisburg International Airport.

We travelled through Middletown, where there is a junction with the Middletown and Hummelstown Railroad, then stopped at the junction with the Columbia Branch after only running at 20 miles an hour since leaving Harrisburg. We sat awaiting our orders and at 5:20 PM, resumed our journey and crossed Swatara Creek then went through the junction and proceeded due south with the Susquehanna River to our west all the way to Perryville. We passed through Collins before reaching a slow order as that thunderstorm had a microburst in it which knocked down trees across our power lines, as well as onto the tracks, and the Norfolk Southern maintenance men had been busy moving branches away from the tracks. Cars fared much worse as at least two dozen had trees land on them doing much damage.

We crept along with trees rubbing against our train then crossed a lake across from Three Mile Island with the trees blocking all chances of seeing it except this one view. We picked up speed down the rest of the branch, reaching Jeb Interlocking before my new mileage eded for the day as we re-entered the Port Road main line.

I had been riding in the vestibule from Three Mile Island south to try to get some pictures of our train on this beautiful route. I really enjoyed riding out in the fresh air, but one must be on constant lookout for branches from the lineside plants. The lighting was perfect and had a fantastic experience all the way down to MP 10 of the Port Road, where I returned to my seat to catch up on the story. We arrived at Perryville at 7:34 PM and sat waiting to get onto the Northeast Corridor until 7:43 PM, when we crossed the Susquehanna River and started towards Baltimore. I relaxed the rest of the way and it had been a great day of train riding and one of the most unique trips I had taken. We arrived at Penn Station at 8:30 PM and I was first off the train, up the stairs and through the station to a waiting taxi, which took me back to the hotel in fifteen minutes for less than a dollar a minute. If I had ridden the bus back, I would not have been picked up until 9:05 PM and then there would have been that connection to the 44 bus. Tomorrow night, I would do the same thing but tonight, early to bed for another early rise.

Another early morning dawned but it was my final bus ride of the trip if everything went according to plan. The 44 bus arrived on time and the 3 bus then took me into town, followed by the usual MacDonald's breakfast. I walked over to the Camden Yard MARC station to wait for the train, which arrived at 8:00 AM with MARC GP40WH-2 66, café-parlour 190 PRR "Braddock Inn", parluor 191 "Hagerstown Inn", low-level coach 7759, bi-level coaches 7802, 7874, 7890 and 7805 and GP40WH-2 63. I boarded 7805 for the journey to New Oxford.

We departed on time at 8:30 AM with Oriole Park and Ravens Stadium to the left and the entrance to Howard Tunnel to the right. We paused at the site of HB Tower to throw a switch before proceeding Carroll, where we took the Westport Branch and my new mileage began on the Baltimore Terminal Railroad. The train went east under the Baltimore Light Rail bridge and another switch was hand-thrown as we entered the former Western Maryland tracks of CSX then passed a large sand and gravel plant before running under the old Baltimore and Ohio route, that I was on Wednesday, with a CSX freight passing overhead. Our route took us under Interstate 95 then under the longest continuously-in-use railroad bridge in the country, the Mount Clare Branch of the Baltimore and Ohio that led to the B&O Railroad Museum, also with a CSX freight crossing overhead.

We then travelled up a beautiful wooded valley with Gwynns Falls Creek running alongside as we went under the Northeast Corridor. Our complete route today was in dark territory with no centralized traffic control, so all our movements were done by track warrant. We climbed up a ridge through West Baltimore before reaching the Metro Subway, which we would parallel for the next ten miles. A subway train passed over us when we went under their bridge then we passed the Cold Springs Metro station before the Metro Shops, went underneath Interstate 695, then Interstate 795 with the subway in the middle. A few minutes later, we ducked underneath Interstate 795 for the last time then out to Owings Mills where the countryside was forested except where man has intruded. We then passed the former Emory Grove siding, where the Western Maryland station still stood and the former Western Maryland line to the west is now the Maryland Midland Railroad. We then entered Western Maryland's Dutch Line for the rest of our journey to New Oxford.

Agricultural interests were now taking place between the groves of trees with many horses seen. Minutes later, we travelled through the rolling hills covered with corn then through the community of Boring, which by the looks of it just might live up to its name, Fowblesburg and Hampstead, where an old Black and Decker plant was located. Hampstead also had a nice wooden station. The next town of Greenmount had a station, now acting as a restaurant, before we reached Maple Grove then wound our way through the hills as the train crossed Gunpowder River, although this one was much smaller than the one on the Northeast Corridor; here it was just a small stream. We crossed it several times before reaching Lineboro, where we crossed the Mason-Dixon Line into Pennsylvania.

We passed through Glenville on the north side of the hills we had just crossed and then Brodbecks before returning to the forest to Pentland along the Cordorus Creek Valley. We reached Porters, where there was a wye, which is the connection to the former Western Maryland line to York, now run by the York Railroad then entered Hanover with the large food plants and where the CSX power for their limestone trains lay over at the former Western Maryland shop location. The Hanover station was still standing, as was the Snack Factory, then a little median street-running occurred as we proceeded out of town passing more industries.

At Bittenger was a large limestone quarrying facility which ships out unit trains to the International Group-Bethlehem's Sparrow Point Furnaces. We ran through a ridge of hills and passed a lake before Berlin then made our way into New Oxford via the backyards and through a cut, prior to passing the New Oxford station and stopping at our destination.

I detrained into a very hot and humid New Oxford. After the customary picture of our train, lunch was now in order and finding all three of possibilties listed in the Chamber of Commerce guide closed this Sunday afternoon, I went on a walkabout.

I was so happy find a Subway that it needed its own picture.

On my return to town, I found a sign welcoming our train to New Oxford, which I did not think many of my fellow NRHS members would see.

The origin of the Borough of New Oxford's name. Back in town, I toured the Depot Museum and saw the model railroad layout in the passenger car behind the depot and across the street was an ice cream parlor in more passenger cars.

C.F. Caldwell caboose in 1972, ex. Strasburg Rail Road C-11, exx. Strasburg Rail Road C-2 1959, exxx. Lynford Swearer, exxxx. Maryland and Pennsylvania 2006, nee Pennsylvania Railroad 476582, built by the railroad in 1910.

It was now time to g out of the heat and humidity for the coolness of the train and I caught up the story, napped and listened to music until departure time but went out briefly to visit Roy and to buy some New Oxford postcards.

There was a medical emergency aboard prior to our departure but we left on time at 4:30 PM and it was an enjoyable trip back as we had a Western Maryland Historical Society member who pointed out everything of interest along our route. The weather was dry all the way back as we crossed the undulating green countryside. Once in Baltimore, another CSX freight was on the Mount Clare Branch and I was amazed that there was a freight on it both this morning and this afternoony.

We arrived back at Camden at 7:23 PM but had to wait for the paramedics to take off that passenger from the New Oxford call.

I took the next light rail train back to Penn Station then took a taxi back to the hotel before the electrical storm hit. The hotel was right in the middle of it as lightning cracked loudly and rain pounded the windows, which I enjoyed before calling it a night.

The taxi cab driver gave me a special rate to the airport so we went under the harbour and arrived at Baltimore Washington Airport twenty minutes later. The First Class line was only four deep as I walked through security before sitting at the gate at 5:45 AM for my 8:46 AM flight. I worked on the story, listened to tunes and did word fill-ins until boarding time then enjoyed watching the sunrise and the passengers running to their planes barefoot because the line through security had become so long that people nearly missed their flight.

I boarded the 737 with my First Class window seat 3A at 8:15 AM and we left the gate on time and soon took off as I gazed upon the Baltimore and Ohio and Northeast Corridor lines that I had ridden last Thursday. The inflight program was CBS Eye on American Airlines. Due to a huge thunderstorm cell, we were routed via Peoria, Illinois then skirted the western side of the cell to Burlington, Iowa and over to Janesville, Wisconsin before making our approach to Chicago's O'Hare Airport from the northwest. O'Hare was still under a ground stop when we landed, which meant nothing had taken off this morning and the runway was very wet as a major storm had just left the area. The flight attendants gave our connection assignments as we would land at Gate H11B and I would need to get to K5 once on the ground. I saw a Metra train on its way to Harvard and downtown Chicago to the southeast in the distance. We touched down at 10:02 AM and taxied to the gate.

Once on the ground, I went to Gate K5, only once I arrived, I was sent back over to Gate H8 to catch my flight there. I needed my exercise anyway! At that gate, the crew were bringing a plane from the hanger since the plane from Detroit could not get here through the storm and no one knew when our plane would arrive. It did so at 11:00, with the same crew that had brought me from Baltimore as they were taken from their normal San Francisco flight. I was aboard in another 737 at 11:08 in my usual 3A seat and we reversed from the gate at 11:31 AM.

We were fourth in line to go out on runway 3-2 left and took off at 11:47 AM, with the inflight film being "Star Trek Nemesis". Later there were excellent views of Shiprock, New Mexico and the Grand Canyon, where the steam train was parked at the South Rim station, as well as Ash Hill, one of my favourite train-watching locations. We touched down at 1:32 PM and I was picked up by my mother, ending this most interesting National Railway Historical Society convention in Baltimore.

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