My Trips and Adventures

After that trip, Me and Ronnie took my car to Connecticut and Rhode Island.  That was another fun trip that we did. James decided not to go last minute because the weather didn’t look promising, but me and Ronnie went anyway and hoped for the best. And the best we got. For a great portion of that day, there were either no clouds, or the clouds were in the perfect spot. We left at 4:00 a.m and I put $20 in my tank the night before so the needle was on the “F” for my gas tank. We went up Route 95 and our first stop was New London Connecticut, where my needle was on “E”. I stopped for gas at this Mobile which had tanks from the 1980’s and we put a combined $40 in my tank, so the Needle was above the “F” in the tank. We went along the water and took some pictures of the lighthouses that you can see from the New London side of the Connecticut River.After spending about 20 minutes taking pictures in a very nice neighborhood, we departed New London and headed for Mystic. We looked at the train schedule and saw that the next train was due in an hour and we decided not to wait. We left Mystic and headed to a town that has the oldest operating Draw bridge in the world.  From there we went to see another lighthouse, then off to Providence. We stopped at the Providence train station and watched an Amtrak train pull in. From there it was to to see a museum that wasn’t even a museum. We saw a New England Central train that was shut down for the day, got our pictures, and it was off to Essex Ct. We passed through Brooklyn Ct. and I was thinking of stopping at Kelsey’s Uncle’s place, but we didn’t. What I came to realize was that many Connecticut drivers are very slow. They go the speed limit. If the speed Limit is 30, they do 30. Nothing more, but maybe less. Once we arrived in Essex, one of the trains were pulling in to the station. We pulled into the parking lot to look at the engine a little and get some pictures and it was off to finding good photography spots.

ABOVE:My car set up to chase the Train.

                We traveled along a county road that paralleled the tracks for a while and it was very nice. We found a few spots and turned down a few roads. And made more turns. Eventually we stumbled upon a Grade Crossing that was right at the bottom of a hill. It had no gates just lights and bells. It was a cool sight to see something like that. We waited about a half hour. During that half hour, we kept hearing a horn, but we didn’t know what it was. The train eventually came and it was pretty cool. After that we went to search where they turned the train around and for more good spots to photograph the train. We went down this road and we saw something heading the opposite way we were going, I took evasive actions and made a quick “U” turn and headed back. We didn’t make it to the crossing we were at because it was too close, so we kept going. We were doing 50 M.P.H around this turn when a car doing 30 popped into view. We had to slam the breaks and risk possibly missing the train. We eventually turned down a side road that had no cars on it and eventually came to another very nice crossing surrounded with trees. Parking as swiftly as possible on the side of the road, we got out our cameras and took positions on either side of the tracks. We heard what sounded like a horn and confusion soon arose between the two of us. Eventually the train came into view and it turned out it was the wrong train! Leading the train of only two cars was an older General Electric Switching locomotive. It had a Hancock Air Whistle, an early attempt to replace steam locomotive whistle that failed because it cannot be heard when the train is traveling at a fast speed. Anyway, after the train passed we went to go look for a few more photo locations. We ended up finding a few locations and we went back to Essex and got ready to chase. When we arrived, the train was getting ready to leave, we watched it pull out and we immediately got in the car and started the chase. We were doing 60 in a 30 when suddenly we spotted another slow driver! He was going down the entire road! We almost flipped out! We ended up missing a photo opportunity on a bridge and Ronnie almost flipped! Well eventually we turned around and headed to the place which we thought they would run the engine around the train. We discovered that it had not turned back to go back to Essex yet so we hung around there until it came. Once it arrived, Ronnie got his pictures and we immediately left and went back to the crossing where we saw the switcher. We again waited for about 15 minutes and it came through. This time, instead of it facing forward, it was leading tender first. We then headed back to that crossing where there was no traffic and watched it go by there, then headed back to Essex to get a few more shots of the train and left. Red Robin was the plan for dinner and then proceeding home afterward. Connecticut was a smooth ride, but once we crossed the Border into New York, we hit a ton of traffic all the way home.

ABOVE: The crossing that we saw no cars go over.

ABOVE:The Chinese steamer pushing the train into Chester. (Photo Courtesy of Ronnie Schenpf)