After putting our luggage in our room, we decided to walk over to Old Sacramento to visit the State Railroad Museum store and on the way there, met Tom Binger from St. Louis, who told us that there was a 5:00 PM Sacramento Southern train so Chris and I decided to ride it as well. Chris went and bought the tickets while I returned to hotel to get our cameras. I realized I had never written a story on this route although I had ridden it several times back in my drinking days. I met Chris and he gave me my ticket then with railroad-related music blaring, we boarded the covered open air car for our trip on the Sacramento Southern Railroad.
The train left the Central Pacific station.
Union Pacific business car 103 "Cheyenne", ex. Union Pacific 106:3 1987, exx. Union Pacific 103:6 1968, exxx. Union Pacific 102:3 1965, nee Union Pacific 5 double bedroom-louge "Baker" built by Pullman-Standard in 1956. It was named "Cheyenne" to commemorate Cheyenne, Wyoming, Union Pacific's center of operations in that state, and the last location on the railroad to maintain steam locomotives. During the early 1950's, at the peak of steam locomotive operations, Cheyenne had the largest roundhouse on the Union Pacific system, large enough to form almost a complete circle.
The Delta King Hotel, a 285-foot-long sternwheel steamboat and the sister ship of Delta Queen, built in Scotland and California for the California Transportation Company's service between Sacramento and San Francisco. She entered service in 1927 and continued until 1940. After wartime service with the United States Navy, Delta King served as an accommodation ship at Kitimat, British Columbia in the 1950s and then returned to California for static use at Old Sacramento where she remains as a hotel, restaurant and venue.
The I Street bridge, which the Sacramento Northern trains once crossed to enter Sacramento from the west.
The Crocker Art Museum.
The Sacramento River. We joked since we had been following the Sacramento River all day, should we not follow it a little more!
Looking back at the I Street bridge.
More of the Sacramento River.
The bicyclists were watching our train pass by.
Rolling down the levee along a bicycle path.
More Sacramento River views.
Santa Fe 4-8-4 2925 built by Baldwin in 1944 that I had seen during my last visit to Sacramento were out here.
That is primer, not rust.
Two freight cars in need of work were behind the steam engines.
The Sacramento River.
Two tanks along our route.
View of the covered open air car.
Land Park.
The Sacramento Marina.
Boats at the Sacramento Marina.
The bicycle path has sections of shade along its route that might be very nice during those hot summer days.
The Sacramento River.
Two views looking north along the Sacramento River.
Another view of the river.
Nearing the end of our southern trip.
The train was approaching Baths.
The Sacramento River.
The Baths station sign.
The last views of the Sacramento River. Here at Bath the engine will run around the train.
The complete engine run-around of our train.
The train was now headed back to the Central Pacific station at Old Sacramento.
The California State Capitol Building could be seen on our return.
The train returned us to the Central Pacific station where our trip was over and we detrained and followed the engine to the turntable.
Sacramento Southern SW8 2008 (nee United States Army 2008 built by General Motors-Electro-Motive Corporation in 1951 and was purchased in 2005 from Aberdeen Proving Grounds) had to come to the turntable to pass the switch before our train's engine could be put away. Then I noticed something else sitting outside.
Western Pacific F7A 913, nee Western Pacific 920A, built by Electro-Motive Division in 1950, was outside due to an event in the museum.
After riding over the old Western Pacific on this trip, it seemed only fitting that this locomotive should be outside during our visit to Old Sacramento.
This unique crossing is how they get equipment into the California State Railroad Museum from the outside world.
Klamath Northern 40-ton 206 built by Baldwin in 1954 was putting the observation car "El Dorado" away for the night.
Capitol Corridor Train 738 crossed the Sacramento River into Sacramento. They Western Pacific 913 was put onto the turntable so it could be returned to the museum after the event this evening.
The final pictures of Western Pacific 913. We returned to our room where I put in the pictures for the rest of today's story, uploaded them then called Winston to let him know that he could proof the stories. Chris and I went to Fat City where I had a big French Dip sandwich and once back in the hotel room, I listened to an hour of Let's Talk Trains from Saturday before I took a shower and called it a night.
6/6/2011 We arose to the wake-up call and I had a quick shower before we checked out and walked back over to the waiting San Joaquin 702 to start the trip home. The train consist's was cab car 8314 "Mt. Pinos", coach 8014 "Colorado River", Cafe "Sacramento Valley" and coach 8018 "Trinity River" with engine 2012 in push mode. We departed Sacramento on time and I started working on yesterday's story while the train turned south at Elvas and headed out of Sacramento, passing the Siemens Plant where the new Amtrak electric engines will be built.
We visited the cafe car for a breakfast of a cinnamon roll and orange juice as the train rolled to Lodi. After our stop at the ACE station in Stockton, we turned east and rolled on to Modesto, our first fresh air stop of the day. On the move again, we rolled to Turlock after meeting San Joaquin 711 and headed south to Modesto, our next fresh air stop. The train ran to Madera then went into the siding for a westbound BNSF freight and once underway again, headed to Fresno then Hanford, Corcoran and Wasco before reaching Bakersfield on time, a great job by this excellent Amtrak crew.
The two of us boarded the bus and it was a quick trip to LAUPT with excellent conversions aboard. We saw Pacific Surfliner 578 leave minutes before we arrived so the 2:25 PM Metrolink 684 became our train to take to Santa Ana. Neither ticketing machine in the station worked so I went up to the end of Tracks 5 and 6 to find the Metrolink machine there had been removed. I found our conductor who let me put my luggage on board and I ran down to the machines in the east tunnel and bought two tickets to Santa Ana. Chris arrived at the train as I returned and we boarded for the quick trip to Santa Ana. I drove us home and Chris then headed home to San Pedro as we ended our excellent adventure aboard the Northern California Explorer.
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