Category Archives: Photography

New Double Trip Report – RGS 20

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I’ve been sitting on quite a bit of RGS 20 material for some time – both shots from its restoration, its initial runs at the Colorado Railroad Museum back in 2020, it’s first excursions onto the mainline in 70 years back in 2021, and then as of just a few weeks ago, photos from a couple winter photo trips on the Durango & Silverton. I decided it was time to get it all rounded up and posted, along with my usual attempt to educate in addition to just posting pretty pictures.

So here you go, it’s a double whammy – two trip reports for the price of one. The first one covers RGS 20 from its initial creation through its return to mainline rails in 2021, and then the second one covers the D&S trips from a few weeks back.

Report #1 – The Return of RGS 20
Report #2 – RGS 20 in the Winter of 2026

New Trip – A Rainy Day with CP 2816

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I haven’t posted a lot of stuff lately, not for lack of railfanning, but for lack of time to do anything except dump it on the computer and get back to work. However, I decided that in the interest of timeliness, I’d post the few shots that I got of Canadian Pacific 2816 coming through Iowa about a month ago. I spent a day in the rain on May 9 following it from Savanna, IL, to Davenport, IA, as it worked its way south from Calgary all the way to Mexico City. Click here to go see the few shots I got from the day.

Sometimes you stand in the rain for three hours and think you’re going to get screwed by a local blocking the shot, but at the last minute everything comes together.

New Trip Report – C&TS Rotary OY Run – Feb 2020

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The weekend of Feb 29 – Mar 1, 2020, saw something that hasn’t been seen on Colorado narrow gauge rails in 23 years – a rotary snowplow in action. 150 lucky individuals, including myself, were on hand to witness D&RGW Rotary OY clear snow from the west side of Cumbres Pass for the first time since 1997.

After only 18 months, I’ve finally gotten through my photos and pulled everything together. They’re in a new trip report over here.

Rotary OY works through light snow just above the second crossing on Saturday, Feb 29, 2020.

New Trip Report: Amtrak 301 Across Colorado

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On Saturday, July 17, Amtrak’s latest new piece of motive power was added to the eastbound California Zephyr leaving Emeryville – Amtrak ALC-42 #301. 301 is the second of 75 new Siemens Charger locomotives purchased to replace the aging P42DCs on the long distance trains. It also wears a scheme commemorating the very first Amtrak painted locomotive – #4316 – from back when Amtrak was founded in 1971.

With the train running late and having nothing else that I really absolutely had to do on Sunday, I decided to go chase it and see this new engine while it was still pristine. I caught up with it at Glenwood, when it was about 3h30 behind schedule, and wound up chasing it all the way to the Moffat Tunnel. The results can be found in a new trip report – Amtrak 301 Across Colorado.

A first good look at AMTK 301 while the train makes a station stop at Glenwood Springs for a surprisingly large number of passengers

New Trip Report – Two Trips to the Texas State RR

In an effort to do literally anything that wasn’t software development or a meeting this evening, I decided to dust off a couple trips I made down to the Texas State Railroad for a pair of photo trains – one in May 2012 while American Heritage Railways (the Durango & Silverton’s parent) was running the line, and another in May 2015 shortly after Iowa Pacific Holdings had taken over and returned some of the equipment to a more historic appearance. I’ve also included a brief history of the route, for anyone curious.

If you’re interested, here’s the page you’re looking for.

Sunset at Palestine, May 2, 2015

The Story of 20 Year Old Film

When I cleaned out my garage in January, I found a box of stuff that probably hadn’t been touched since my ex and I bought this place 15 years ago. At the bottom was a small Ziploc bag with eight rolls of color print film in it, shot but never developed. Now given that I stopped shooting film in early 2001, that gives you a minimum possible age for this stuff. Could there be any hope for this stuff? Back when I still shot film, heat was pretty much enemy #1 and I was extremely careful about keeping film cold if it wasn’t in the camera. This stuff, on the other hand, had been in a box in a hot garage for nearly two decades.

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