Nostalgia & History > 1956 excursion: Where is SP 2476?

On May 5 and 6, 1956, the Central Coast Railway Club and the Pacific Railroad Society ran a trip called the "Spring Fever Excursion," described in the flyer below. John Plytnick was on this trip, and the Western Railway Museum Archives has a few color photos he took on both days. The photo below is from the second day, which the flyer describes as a "fast run" from Monterey to San Luis Obispo, CA. It was taken somewhere between Castroville and Santa Margarita on the SP Coast Line, but I haven't been able to figure out just where. Anyone recognize this scene?

---

---

---

What a wonderful scene.....and people "wandering" all over the property.

Think that's an oil column next to the water column?
In 4/54 the only oil between Watsonville Jct and
SLO was King City.

The King City pic on p53 of the Coast Line Pictorial
shows the light pole etc-- and those trees or
whatever they are directly down the track.

What bridge is the doubleheader on?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/05/15 15:02 by timz.

Hi Evan,

The photo in the flyer shows engines 2915 and 2374 on the Davenport branch, the trip was on April 25, 1948. It ran San Francisco to Santa Cruz/Davenport. The trestle shown is the Wilder trestle.

Dave

kilroydiver Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Hi Evan,
>
> The photo in the flyer shows engines 2915 and 2374
> on the Davenport branch, the trip was on April 25,
> 1948. It ran San Francisco to Santa
> Cruz/Davenport. The trestle shown is the Wilder
> trestle.
>
> Dave


I agree with Dave. Also, the second photo was taken at Rincon on the Olympia Branch (ex-San Jose-Santa Cruz Line).

Thanks for the King City suggestion, timz. I was leaning in that direction, but couldn't find any landmarks to line up with those in the 1956 view. I just went searching for "Hotel El Camino Real California" on Google and came up with a postcard from King City that appears to show the same building as the one to the left of SP 2476:

https://www.cardcow.com/508463/hotel-camino-real-king-city-california/

Thanks also for the photo ID's in the flyer. Just for reference, this is what the Wilder Trestle photo runby looked like for the 1956 "Spring Fever" trip:

---