Western Railroad Discussion > Colorado to Texas Trip Day 5: Transcon Evening

=14pxThe latest installment...

Day 1: https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,5679220
Day 2: https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,5679685
Day 3: https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,5680212
Day 4: https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,5680682

Posting this one slightly late since we got to our hotel pretty late last night...

After a great day of chasing KYLE, we woke up yesterday in Salina, KS. 

1) We dedicated a good chunk of our day to backtracking up to Deshler, Nebraska to see Spring Creek Model Trains. It was well worth the trip- one of the largest and best-organized train stores I've ever seen. I've been a customer of theirs for years, and it was super cool to finally see the brick and mortar.

2) Back in Salina, we didn't see anything moving, despite the immense amount of trackage. There were some nice and fresh looking GP60s parked in the UP yard.

3) We followed the K&O from Salina to Newton, but it was dead. Within seconds of pulling into Newton, we saw a BNSF manifest, which we weren't set up to photograph. Newton's yard is pretty accessible and this ex-ATSF slug was neat. 
 

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4) An old GP7U in the yard. 

5-6) We heard on the scanner that a yard job derailed, which slowed mainline traffic for a bit. There were a few trains that passed, but we missed every single one. Not used to the train volume of the Transcon! Anyways, using that time, we managed to make it over to the BNSF deadline. The deadline in Newton is also surprisingly accessible, being just off of a public road and what appears to be a public park. Surprised that there wasn't any graffiti.

 

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7) A cascade green GP39M- the two road numbers was an interesting feature. 

8) A GP28M. This is one of the rebuilds that BN did on a GP9 frame, this one being ex-GN 906.

9) Hearing some scanner chatter, we went back over to the main. Soon, a train emerged.

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10) It was a unit train of "protein gons," something I didn't realize was a thing until I looked it up. Cool!

11) Next up, we drove down to a crossing south of town and got a colorful consist on a northbound manifest. Haven't seen much Ferromex lately, since they can't lead anymore with PTC.

12) With minutes of daylight left, we saw a local head south with a bluebonnet SD40-2 leader. 

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13) A closeup of the SD40-2

With the light fading and having stayed in Newton a bit beyond planned, we hopped on I-35 to OKC for our last night on the road. Stay tuned...


Thanks for viewing!

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That 1648 bluebonnet is a mess with all that junk sprouting from above the cab and over the wind sceens! Yuck!
Thanks for a lot of interesting posts recently. 
Go

Gonut1 Wrote:
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> That 1648 bluebonnet is a mess with all that junk
> sprouting from above the cab and over the wind
> sceens! Yuck!
> Thanks for a lot of interesting posts recently. 
> Go

Still looks better than the CSX Spongebob Squarecabs to me.

Have been thoroughly enjoying your travel logs... love that bluebonnet... takes me back.