Western Railroad Discussion > The INDY Road pt 12: Westward in horrid weather

At the end of part #11 I mentioned a stop-off in Terre Haute, IN on my way west. But I forgot to warn you that my old, umm… friend, Mr Cloud had rejoined my travels. And that rascal brought along a couple of other party-crashers, namely Misters Rain & Snow. So leaving Dayton on the morning of the 13th I looked at the heavens and decided to put a hefty chunk of mileage behind me. With the adversarial weather I minimized any sight-seeing delays along the way and arrived in the Terre Haute area just after lunch time. Even with the cloud cover my picture-takin’ started out with an interesting find…

1. The first RR action I found in Terre Haute was also my first up-close look at the Indiana RR. Here is INRD 3806 with a cut of cars crossing N Fruitridge Avenue. I took a little tour of town, shooting record shots at several potential locations. The weather was slowly getting worse, so…

2. …I found a spot next to the Wabash Valley RR Museum and parked for a while. I had myself a quick lunch, hoping to see some RR traffic. While gnawing on a sandwich it started raining lightly. Of course that meant not 1 but 2 trains came by, crossing 8th Avenue. First there was CSXT 3415 with a coal train (empty?). 8 minutes later…

3. …CSXT 6439 rolled by with a manifest.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/27/17 17:08 by santafe199.

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4. & 5. I got the sense that I may be seeing more trains so I drove back up to the 3rd Avenue crossing where I had seen a huge overhead signal bridge. It didn’t take long for CSXT 2699 to come by backward with a cut of cars. But it certainly wasn’t a through train. That, and the fact that the rain had turned into a light, but very wet snow/slush told me it was probably time to hit the road. Maybe I could drive out from underneath this crappy weather…
(Photos 1-5 taken in Terre Haute, IN)

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I left Terre Haute late in the afternoon with no sign that my nemesis Mr Cloud would go away. Even so I passed into Illinois keeping to US hwy 40 rather than parallel I-70. The precipitation had stopped, but I didn’t see any RR activity at all. I did see some interesting & unusual sights, including an old Sinclair Dinosaur and what’s billed as the “World’s Largest Rocking Chair”, both on the main drag in Casey, IL:

6. Lookie there! A real live dinosaur with bright red eyes! Well… check that. Maybe it’s porcelain after all. I wonder if the gang from American Pickers have been here???

7. I also saw this huge rocking chair and right away thought of Lily Tomlin. Those of you old enough to remember NBC-TV’s “Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-in” won’t have to Google up one of Tomlin’s characters: ‘Edith-Ann’ (and that’s the truth… ;^)
(Photos 6-7 taken in Casey, IL)



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 04/27/17 17:11 by santafe199.

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After the pleasant diversion in Casey I got on the darkening westbound trail. I finally saw a train, but of course it was nearly dark. Good thing for digital technology, though:

8. This image is a re-post from just over a month ago when my thread title asked “Where’s the train?”

9. & 10. We’re looking south from US hwy 40 at the 1950th St crossing just east of Teutopolis, IL. I had spotted an eastbound headlight and had to quickly double back to this crossroad I had just passed to try some highly spur-of-the-moment shenanigans with the ol’ Nikon. With a focal length of 90mm I hand held a sequence of images at 1/250th of a second @ f5.3. The ISO was already set at 800 but I literally didn’t have the time to run it up any higher. I also forgot to eyeball the lead unit for an number, so the only description I can give is that it is owned by Uncle Pete and had this big American flag on the side...



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 04/27/17 17:14 by santafe199.

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Just one more:

11. AMTK 29 glides to a stop with train #393 (I think) at Effingham, IL. With this obligatory passenger train photography concluded I called it a (soggy) day and went off into the night in search of a motel and a hot meal, not necessarily in that order.
(All photos taken March 13, 2017)

Sleep well! We gotta get up with the chickens and go shoot Amtrak #390 first thing. The we’ll get back on the westward trail, heading toward a very large river…

Thanks for riding along!
Lance Garrels
santafe199

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Seen that chair last year on a trip East and other BIG items in the building and along some of the streets. upkpfan