Western Railroad Discussion > Lemons in an Orange Tree

On a recent trip with Lance Garrels (santafe199) and myself we went over to Northern Missouri in search of shooting oranges (for the sake of this thread); particularly under the classic Santa Fe signal bridges at Mendon. While we kept getting our fair share of oranges several out of place lemons kept showing up in our viewfinders. I've been well aware for many years that good ol' Uncle Pete has trackage rights over this piece of former Uncle John territory, this IIRC carrying over from the SP. We mostly got normal lemons we could've just hung around Eastern Kansas for but one very sweet Rocky Mountain flavored lemon showed up, either way we took these lemons and made lemonade! I'll let you decide if that part of the deal is sweet or sour...
1) A quartet of SD70Ms led by UP 5126 point the ZG4PX 24 west at Mendon.
2) A trio of GE's led by UP 7360 point 5126s counterpart stack train, the ZTUG4 east near Marceline.
3) I did say this was a stack train right? It was very well 95% autoracks but 10 stacks hang on to the rear end.

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4) We head into Marceline and shoot the old coaling tower that still looks good. Lance, preferring red and silver proclaimed his disfavor of seeing this lemon, UP 7315 pop around the curve with westbound autorack loads.

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5, 6, & 7) Heavily backlit, UP 5455 points the KLBG4 22 east at Marceline...with a very refreshing, sweet tasting lemon bring up the rear in the form of the D&RGW heritage unit, UP 1989. This was my first time shooting a heritage unit on a freight train in daylight.

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Sometimes, when the lemons aren't sweet, the element you pick (or shoot) them in is sweet. Lance and I got a huge break in shooting lemons, getting several oranges, and a pair of black berries (or thoroughbreds) but when the last gasp moment came at Carrollton, it was Uncle Pete who gave us (or me atleast) our shots of the day, month, year, heck I'd go as far as saying the best shots so far in my 5 year railfan photography career!
8) C45ACCTE UP 7766 approaches the old US 24 overpass in Carrollton with an eastbound stack train.
9) The 7766 poses perfectly in my "shot of a lifetime".

P.S. Lance was debuting a new Nikon D5100 (?) and I was using his 3000 on this day, November 24th, 2012.

Thanks for the lemonade!
Lucas McIntyre

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Great series of photo's. Love the story behind it as well..

Clarence
Lees Summit MO

Great shots Lucas and good story to let us know what went on during the day. Glad to see you for one of the Heritage units.
Brian Stevens

Posted from iPhone

"Oranges and Lemons
said the bells of
St. Clemons..."
Start of an old English children's rhyme.

railstiesballast Wrote:
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> "Oranges and Lemons
> said the bells of
> St. Clemons..."
> Start of an old English children's rhyme.


Here comes a candle to light you to bed,
Here comes a chopper to chop off your head.

Excellent pictures, Lucas!

Thanks for the kind words all.