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To Winterail 2017 3/16/2017

The Albany and Eastern, a shortline freight railway headquartered in Lebanon, Oregon, also runs the Santiam Excursion train. Since Lebanon is within half an hour's drive from Corvallis, site of Winterail, I decided to explore the possibility of organizing a pre-Winterail excursion, the first such trip I had ever organized. I contacted the railroad and worked with Rose to put together a trip from Lebanon to Sweethome on the former Oregon & Electric Railroad, then I asked my friend Bart Jennings, who had run many rare mileage trips over the years, to promote it to the e-mail Mileage List and I posted it on Trainorders.com, Altamont Press Discussion Board and the Railroad Forum. Vic Neves, the Winterail producer, then put it up on the Winterail website and tickets started to be bought.

I needed 60 pasasengers to break even and by the end of February, I had made it thanks to myself and two other riders buying four extra tickets each. Bob and Elizabeth had planned to ride Amtrak to Portland but mudslides forced them to drive, so would pick us up at the Portland International Airport instead of me renting a car. Chris Parker was having auditory issues and would not know until the morning of the trip if he was joining us; he sent an e-mail in the middle of the night, giving his regrets that he could not attend, which broke his string of attending consecutive Winterails since 2006.

3/16/2017I arose at 4:30 AM, had an early breakfast then checked e-mail and found more people wanting tickets. I bemoaned the fact that people wait until the last minute to buy tickets for an event, but filled their orders. My mother, whom I awoke at 5:40 AM, drove me to John Wayne Airport where I went through TSA pre-check security without any problems. My number for boarding the plane was A2, so I had a good window seat and then a gentleman with some very interesting tattoos sat next to me for the flight to San Jose.

This would be a quick flight and we reversed out of the gate on time and took off into a sky that surprisingly had no fog this morning. We flew north and had clear views until we reached about Gilroy, where the clouds took over then descended through these clouds and landed at San Jose, where I had to go from Gate 25 to 19. I called Elizabeth to let her know that the pilot knew the way to San Jose and to find out where she was. She and Bob were in Olympia so our connection in Portland was looking quite promising. I had an interesting talk with a gate agent about hockey, alcoholism and other topics until I was boarded, taking the same seat I had on the other plane.

This flight started out rather weirdly as we circled twice over the same region to gain altitude then went east over Altamont Pass before flying directly north toward Portland. I saw several railroads in northern California, as well as Mount Lassen, but not Mount Shasta as it was shrouded in clouds. Once in Oregon, I saw my favourite cinder cone and had a view of Crater Lake, then it was only the mountain peaks with the sun peeking out from over them. We descended out of the clouds into Portland, where once on the ground, I called Elizabeth to find out where they were so they could meet me down on the arrival level. Bob and Elizabeth pulled up and I loaded my belongings in the back seat of their car and we were off.

We left the airport and headed out to Interstate 84 where we quickly all realized people in Oregon do not know how to drive in dry weather. The traffic was backed up as highway crews were clearing an accident and then there was even a man standing in the middle of the freeway talking on his cell phone, probably wondering why he was there. We passed the accident site but the traffic continued to crawl and it was not until three miles later that we noticed there was a lane closed and a big truck that all these Oregonites had to gawk at. From here we made excellent time the rest of the way to Hillsboro, our first stop.

The Hillsboro Southern Pacific station, built in 1914, and is the office for the Portland and Western Railroad. We started toward Forest Grove and saw an impressive trestle bridge, commenting that we wished we could photograph a train on it. It was at this time that we saw a local going from Hillsboro to the end of the line at Stimson so quickly stopped at the grade crossing on SW 345th Street to catch the train.

The train passed by our location with Willamette and Pacific GP39-2 2301 "Sheridan", nee Santa Fe 3600, leading. From here we went west on Oregon Highway 8 to Forest Grove and after I remembered where the depot was on Google Earth, we found it and Elizabeth and I went to take pictures.

The Forest Grove Oregon Electric station built in 1908. We then drove south to Carlton.

The Southern Pacific Carlton station, now the Ken Wright Cellars Tasting Room winery.

The surprise wig-wag at Carlton. Our next stop was McMinnville.

The McMinnville Southern Pacific station built in 1912. We drove toward Perryvale Road south of Amity, but stopped when we were on Bethel Road.

The Oregon Electric sub-station building, built in 1916, still stands on McCoy Lane off Bethel Road.

A surprise grain elevator in Oregon. I had never seen one in the Willamette Valley before and it seemed as though it was a scene out of Kansas. We made our way to Perryvale Road where there was supposed to be a Southern Pacific depot but in reality there was not one, so continued to Albany, taking a very unique route where we actually went down a street called Parker and I called Chris Parker but had to leave a message. This routing was so that we could cross the Willamette River, where if we would have been able to use the closed ferry, we could have reached Interstate 5, but with the ferry being closed, we had to get back to Highway 20 to reach Albany, which led us almost straight to the Amtrak station.

The former Southern Pacific station in Albany, built in 1908, which is a stop on the Coast Starlight and Amtrak Cascades.

The southbound Coast Starlight, Train 11.

A few minutes later came Amtrak Cascades 508 which Julie, Amtrak's automated agent, said had a service disruption. We drove to the other side of the yard to see what the Willamette and Pacific had to offer.

Portland and Western GP40-2 3001 "Wilsonville", nee Norfolk and Western GP40 1377, built by Electro-Motive Division in 1967 and scrapped in 2023.

Portland and Western RP-E4D slug 101, ex. Norfolk Southern 9728, nee Norfolk and Western GP18 945, built by Electro-Motive Division in 1961.<

Willamette and Pacific GP39-2 2313, nee Santa Fe 3612, built by Electro-Motive Division in 1974.

I could not avoid photographing into the sun Willamette and Pacific GP9E 1801, ex. Southern Pacific 3855, nee Southern Pacific 5830, built by Electro-Motive Division in 1959, painted in Southern Pacific's black widow colours. We then drove into Lebanon and when we came to the first grade crossing, the gates were down so we quickly made a U-turn and went to a grade crossing and beat the train.

Albany and Eastern freight train with GP38-3 2001, nee Illinois Central 9502, pulling the train back from Sweethome, the destination of tomorrow's trip. From here we went over to the starting point of that trip, the Southern Pacific station and duly noted the Oregon Electric Burlington Northern signpost signifying this was once the Oregon and Electric's railroad to Sweethome.

The Southern Pacific station built in 1908. Afterwards we drove to the railroad's headquarters on Industrial Way to see if anyone was there and finally called the phone number, reaching the operator who informed me they closed at 3:00 PM.

Albany and Eastern B40-8 1841, ex. Union Pacific 1841, exx. Union Pacific 5650, nee St. Louis-Southwestern 8041, built by General Electric in 1988.

Albany and Eastern B40-8 1807, ex. Union Pacific 1807, exx. Union Pacific 5616, nee Southern Pacific B39-8 8007, built by General Electric in 1987 and Albany and Eastern SD9R 5399, ex. Lavacot Locomotive Works 5399, exx. Lavacot Locomotive Works 4364, exxx. Willamette Valley Railway 4364, exxxx. Southern Pacific 4364, exxxxx. Southern Pacific SD9 3877, nee Southern Pacific 5399, built by Electro-Motive Division in 1955.

We then checked into the Shanico Inn and a little later, Bob, Elizabeth and I had dinner at the next door Appletree Restaurant, where I had an excellent twelve ounce steak. It had been a great way to start off a Winterail weekend. Back at the room, Elizabeth typed the travelogue while I dictated and we watched some Disney Channel programs.

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