The passenger train took us back up Niles Canyon to Farwell where we stopped.
The Farwell station sign. We all detrained for our next photo runbys.
Our passenger train reversed down the canyon to get into the clear for the freight train.
Next the freight train reversed by our location.
Freight train photo runby 3.
Passenger train photo runby 2.
As soon as the passenger train returned to pick us up, we then continued up Niles Canyon to our next location.
View of Niles Canyon. Soon we all detrained.
The passenger train reversed down the canyon to clear out of the way of the freight train.
Next the freight train reversed by our photo location.
Freight train photo runby 4.
Passenger train photo runby #3. From here, we all reboarded to our last photo runby of the trip.
Our rear brakeman before the passenger train reversed into the clear for the last time today.
The passenger train reversed by our photo location.
Robert Dollar Company 3.
Mason County Logging 7.
The freight train reversed.
Freight train photo runby 5.
Passenger train photo runby 4. We all reboarded and the train returned us to Sunol. I would like to thank the Niles Canyon Railway for the excellent trip this morning. It had been a fantastic railroad photo experience in Niles Canyon and I hope they do it again in the future.
The Trip HomeThe three of us departed Sunol, taking Interstate 680 north to Interstate 580 East and exited at the Greenville Road exit, stopping at Subway for lunch. Afterwards, we drove Altamont Pass Road and wwere almost all the way across when we had to turn around as we saw a Union Pacific stack train heading west, so the chase was on.
Union Pacific 7858 West. We overtook this train and made our way to the Greenville Trestle at the west end of Altamont Pass.
The train crossing the Greenville Trestle.
We drove back east.
The DPU crosses the Greenville Trestle. From here, we drove back over Altamont Pass and rejoined Interstate 580, which we took to California Highway 132, taking that to California Highway 33, where we joined the former Southern Pacific West Valley Line to see what was left of it.
The former Southern Pacific water tower at Wesley. We followed this line to Newman before rejoining it north of Los Banos, where lumber cars were stored then the line ended. Through Los Banos, it is a rail trail and south of there, one has to look hard to see where the track once was.
In Oxalis, we found the rails leading to this old industry Southern Pacific once served. We found the tracks again just north of Firebaugh and this part was served from Fresno. We drove beside the tracks to Mendota, where we turned east on California Highway 180 which we took past Kerman. There, we headed south then southeast on Henderson Road, which took us to Mountain View Road and turned left. Once we reached the BNSF tracks, we zig-zagged, crossing the tracks four times and at the fifth crossing, saw a headlight.
San Joaquin 717 north of Laton. We crossed the Kings River and took the next road east across the BNSF to California Highway 43, which we took south to Wasco.
Savage GP7 8611, ex. Savage 2156, exx. Santa Fe 2156, nee Santa Fe 2797 built in 1952, at Wasco.
San Joaquin 703 just south of Wasco. We then drove into Bakersfield and had dinner at Texas Roadhouse and took longer than we expected, so did not know if we would make Pacific Surfliner 796 at 10:10 PM. Chris did a good job of driving and we started passing San Joaquin buses. We arrived at the East Portal of Los Angeles Union Station at 10:08 PM and I reached the platform with 45 seconds to spare if the train had left on time, but it was holding for the buses we had passed. We departed LAUPT 17 minutes late and it was a quick trip back to Santa Ana, arriving there at 11:14 PM. I drove home for the night and tomorrow afternoon, would leave for La Plata, but that is another story. It had been a very successful trip to Winterail 2010 and the Niles Canyon Railroad Winterail Steam Special.
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