Elizabeth and I arose early this morning as the train was scheduled to leave at 8:00 AM with boarding starting at 7:00 AM. After our regular morning routine, we had the hotel's breakfast and we drove to the South Central Florida Express shops' boarding location in Clewiston.
Our train waiting for the passengers this morning.
Clewiston scene. We were at the back of the line to board so had to ride in the "Lake Okeechobee" coach today. At 7:30, after the safety meeting, we were allowed to board. The train left at 8:00 AM heading towards Sebring and rolled down the miles to Moore Haven, stopping at the east side of the Caloosahatchee Canal and detrained at milepost 934.3.
The forward move.
Photo runby 1 at Caloosahatchee Canal swing bridge.
Posted photos here. We reboarded the train and headed north to Childs for the next photo runby.
Fisheating Creek. I, and the majority of the other 100 attendees, were now on new rail miles at Palmdale north to Sebring. The train proceeded to Childs and we unloaded for the photo runby at milepost 898.3.
The photo line at Childs.
The forward move.
The cane loader at this location.
Photo runby two at Childs. We just turned around the photo line.
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Photo runby three at Childs. We reboarded the train and headed north.
Childs cane loader.
Lake Placid in Florida.
Sebring, Milepost 876, was as far north as we went. We saw Amtrak's Silver Star approaching the Sebring station on its way north from this location before we headed south.
All of the lines on the map that we will have ridden by the end of the weekend. We returned to Lake Placid for lunch.
The railroad mural in town. Elizabeth and I detrained and went to Glenda Jean's Country Kitchen where I had a hamburger and Elizabeth BLT with potato salad. There were a few restaurants in town as well as a farmer's market which some of our passengers visited.
Elizabeth posed in front of the Lake Placid mural.
Three views of our train in Lake Placid.
The ever-inspring Bart Jennings and his mileage book. We bought an ice cream from the truck that was there and returned to the train. Once everyone was aboard, we proceeded straight back to Moore Haven and our next photo runby location at milepost 934.3.
The forward move across the Caloosahatchee Canal Swing Bridge.
We all witnessed the swing bridge open for river traffic and a speed boat went through.
Note the rails are elevated.
A larger boat made its way up stream.
Now the bridge will close.
Photo runby four at the Caloosahatchee Canal Swing Bridge.
The passengers returning to our train. The train headed to Wedgeworth for our final photo runbys of the day, including a surprise at 935.8.
Photo runby five with a cane train.
Photo runby six at the Corbett siding.
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Photo runby seven.
Photo runby eight at Corbett siding. We then highballed it back to Clewiston, ending another great trip. The two of us drove back to the hotel then later went to Sonny's Barbecue where we met Tom Marino and Todd Hunter, fellow train riders of our trip. Since the restaurant was extremely busy and we would have a long time to wait, the four of us left and went to Burger King where I enjoyed a hamburger and vanilla shake and Elizabeth had a fish sandwich. Great conversations were had after which all returned to the hotel for the night.
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