Earlier in the week, Conway Scenic operated a ballast train with GP35 216 to Crawford Notch and then worked its way east through the famous Gateway cut and over the Girders bridge.
There was cosmic lighting, with low clouds scraping over the tops of the mountains with shafts of sunlight reaching the ground.
To gain necessary elevation, I climbed up into the Gateway cut, following in the footsteps of generations of previous photographers.
I exposed these photos using my Nikon Z6.
A few weeks ago, I accompanied the Conway Scenic Railroad ballast train on its journey up the Mountain.
I had multiple things on my agenda: we needed a accurate accessment of where ballast was needed for future trips; I wanted to inspect the limits of some recent slow orders; I’m looking to rework the company Timetable and was checking various aspects of the right-of-way; and I wanted to photograph the ballast train crew at work.
Many years ago, I traveled with a branch line ballast train in Ireland, where the locomotive driver said to me, “My crew, they’re allergic to work!”
Nothing could further from the truth with Conway Scenic’s work train crew. Dumping stone is a physically taxing job and not for the faint of heart. Our guys put 110 percent of effort into the job and earn every dime of their pay.
By contrast, all I had to do was run along with the train, make notes and expose digital photos—a few of which I’ve posted here.
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Yesterday, Thursday May 5, 2022 was a beautiful bright day in Conway, New Hampshire.
I traveled with the ballast train, which was the only train moving over the Conway Scenic Railroad.
Since the train made a number of stops to drop stone, I had ample opportunity to make photographs.
I exposed these views with my Lumix LX7, but also made a few photos of the lads working the train using my Nikon Z6 mirrorless digital camera. I’m saving the Z6 photos for a later post.
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Another in my ballast train series.
Yesterday, April 22, 2022, Conway Scenic Railroad operated a Work Extra on the Redstone Line to Pudding Pond to dump ballast.
I traveled with the train and used my Panasonice Lumix LX7 to document the work.
This was the first time since the railroad acquired former Maine Central GP38 255 that it worked out the Redstone Branch as far east as Pudding Pond.
The significance of this foray east was that old 255 would have routinely worked Maine Central freights on this same section of track between the late 1960s and the early 1980s.
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I was still new to the concept of digital imagery on 22 April 2010 when I made these views with my old Lumix LX3 of an Irish Rail ballast train running around at Platform 10 at Dublin’s Heuston Station.
This view from the top of the Phoenix Park Tunnel was just a short walk from my old apartment at Islandbridge. The dust in the air was the result of a volcanic eruption in Iceland.
The old four-wheel ballast wagons were nearing the end of their days in permanent-way traffic.
In just a few days, I hope to be able to make a modern day view from this Irish vantage point. Fingers crossed.
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Upon leaving the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania, Kris and I heard a distant locomotive horn.
Although, there were no trains scheduled, I surmised there was an extra on the line, so we drove to the first grade crossing west of the yard and waited.
After just a few minutes, Strasburg Rail Road’s former New York Central SW8 ambled westbound towing a lone three-bay hopper carrying ballast.
That was a lucky catch!
We then drove to the parking lot opposite the shop where I made a few more photos.
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Below are a few more views from my travels with the Conway Scenic ballast train last week.
All were exposed using my Nikon Z6 mirror-less digital camera.
Any favorites?
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On Friday, I was attached to the Conway Scenic Railroad ballast extra, which I documented, but also used as transportation to make video of the Conway Valley train.
Working with my Nikon Z6 mirrorless digital camera, I made this sequence of photos of the ballast train in the rich September morning light.
It was a beautiful day to make photos. More to follow!
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The unusual moves; the uncommon train; the special unscheduled and unexpected operation. These are what fascinate me about railroads.
On most days, Conway Scenic operates its selection of normally scheduled excursion. By contrast it’s work trains are comparatively rare.
Yesterday, September 3, 2021, Conway Scenic’s former Maine Central GP7 No. 573 ran light to from North Conway to Conway to collect a pair of ballast cars that were expected to be loaded.
After lunch the engine returned with the ballast cars to North Conway where it ran around and proceeded back to Conway.
I was on-hand to make these photos using my Nikon Z6.
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Kris Sabbatino and I were very lucky to catch a relative unusual move on Cape Cod last Friday (April 23, 2021).
Mass Coastal’s rare EMD GP28 (road number 2009) led a train of MassDOT ballast cars eastward on the former New Haven Railroad at West Barnstable, Massachusetts.
I was delighted to catch this unusual locomotive (one of less than three dozen built) in good sunlight. In addition to this digital photo exposed using my Nikon Z6, I also made a sequence of color slides with my Canon EOS 3 with 100-400mm lens.
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In August 2003, I exposed this photo of an Irish Rail ballast train at Tipperary that was in the passing loop.
At the time I was working with a Rolleiflex Model T that used 120 size roll film.
I was using Kodak Tri-X (400 ISO) that I processed in Ilfotec HC and toned in Selenium to improve the highlights. I scanned the photo last night using an Epson V600 flatbed scanner.
There is an amazing amount of detail in this photo. I’ve enlarged one small section of it as an example.
At the time Irish Rail class 141 number 169 was one of the last locomotives operating with the old ‘IR’ logo, a herald remarkably similar to the Portuguese Railways logo.
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