After enjoying an air conditioned night
of sleep on the Colorado River at the Blue Water Resort, I awoke to a
nice view of the river. It was an oasis in the desert.
Actually, I had been concerned about getting up on time since I could
not get a wake up call from the resort and I didn't trust the clock
radio in the room. However, since I have to be at the worker bee
job at normally 6:00 AM, I woke up before my cell phone alarm.
On the bus ride back to the Grand Canyon Limited train, I had a view of
the A & C bridge over the river. That photo was not worth
posting, but the photo of the rear end of the train is. Notice
the pizza guy to the left of the bungalow. To the right of the
bungalow, one can see the two locomotives. The red and white one
is lettered for the San Joaquin Valley Railroad Co. The motive
power consist from Cadiz from the
prior afternoon was also back at the yard.
On the first day, the Grand Canyon Limited ran 85 miles on the Arizona
& California Railroad. We were subject to a slow order of 15
miles per hour. There was a lot of conjecture of why that
happened. First, transportation systems have rules and
regulations. The Federal Railroad Administration has jurisdiction
over many aspects of railroads. There are rules regarding freight
only railroads and when a passenger train is to be run over freight
only track, there is to be a physical inspection of said track.
So, an FRA rule caused the A & C management to run the GCL at a
much reduced speed over the entire route which severely impacted our
schedule. We had expected to run at freight train speeds of 35
and 40 miles per hour. We now had 106 miles from Parker to
Matthie with a slow order. That's life on a railroad, so we
boarded the Grand Canyon Limited after not much of a night of sleep.
Being the rare visit of a train to a location such as this, people were
out to see it en masse.
Once under way, people were still checking our train out.
A highway paralleled the track which enabled our entended family to
follow us.
There were those people again and finally some industry with a rail
spur.
We even had friends in the sky again today.
Word was passed around by the NRHS car hosts that we would be stopping
for a run by. We slowed to a stop at the town of
Bouse. It appears that citizens of Arizona take their arms
seriously. I think Arizona and Alaska have the best flags.
Imagine, Arizona is the 48th state admitted to the union and is
celebrating 100 years of statehood and Alaska is the 49th state and
just celebrated 50 years of statehood in 2009. The fishing is
better in Alaska though.
Our friend with the cool vest was on the ground in Bouse. Philip
had an Alaska Railroad patch as well as non railroad patches. I
think KCS is his favorite. In any case, we all were about to
enjoy a runby of the Grand Canyon Limited. Even the town of Bouse
and the automobile entourage could partake.
Grand Canyon Limited Page 2
