Steam & Excursion > Mount Washington Cog Railway

Visiting the world's first cog railway has been on my To Do list for a while.

MartyBernard has posted several great reports on the operation earlier this year, so I recommend people use TO's search function to find those. Here's one link to get you started:

https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,4521087

I had planned a Fall Foliage trip to New England the first weekend of October, but couldn't commit to visiting Mt. Washington until I found a reasonable rental car rate out of Boston. A compact car by all rental car agencies were priced only $10 less per day than Hertz's AMG Mercedes CLA45 "Dream Collection," so yield pricing was unfriendly to my needs, especially when the AMG did not come with unlimited mileage (75 miles per day). By the time yield pricing gave me a Minivan at a ~60% discount last minute, the 8 am steam departure at the Cog Railway was sold out.

So I booked the 8:30 am biodiesel trip, then studied photos, maps, and schedules to plan a "chase" of the steam train.

When I showed up at the Base Station to pick up my tickets, I noticed a long line with people asking for refunds. Due to the notoriously fickle weather (heavy fog), the Cog Railway was going to run the trains only halfway to Summit. For people still willing to ride the trains, the Cog Railway was offering partial refund ($31 out of $72), but some of the people in front of me wanted full refunds. When it came my turn to talk to the ticketing staff, I asked to change my biodiesel reservation to steam, and the lady gladly gave me the partial refund AND the steam ticket, which was no longer sold out.

Glad I wasn't first in line. Sometimes, early birds don't get the worm.

First clip is of the steam (#9, "Waumbek") climbing from the coaling area to the platform area. Based on studying the satellite and street view maps, I was going to get this clip whether I rode the biodiesel or the steam trip.

Since I was going to ride the steam train, I had to ditch the clip to get the steam going across the newly-rebuilt steel bridge over Ammonoosuc River. So the rest of the video was taken from inside the train. In the last two clips, the steam train is descending the grade, and you can see some of the braking action done by the brakeman/narrator riding with us in the passenger car.

- Cog steam train on display at the intersection of Hwys 3 & 302, about 10 miles away.
- Another cog steam on display, at Hwy 302 & Base Station Rd.
- Video of the cog steam train.
 

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Fall foliage season just got started in the White Mountain area (New Hampshire).
 

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I also got some video clips of Cog Railway's biodiesel trains. I caught the non-revenue "MOW" train in the first clip.

- Sign posted at the entrance to the Base Station area.
- #9 "Waumbek" near the coaling area.
- Video of the biodiesel trains.

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Cchan, that's the most interesting coverage of the Mt. Washington cog that I have ever seen.  Nice job.

nycman Wrote:
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> Cchan, that's the most interesting coverage of the
> Mt. Washington cog that I have ever seen.  Nice job.

Thanks. I'll try to visit again, just so I can hit summit. I was shown photos of Summit Station with snow, and I'd love to see that in person.

Few more stuff, and that's it for the report.

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Very well done, thank you!

 

The Engineer of the steam locomotive, was he deaf?
If so, he is the same engineer when I rode several years, ago.
Pat

In over 50 years of railfanning, It is remains one of my extreme exeriences.  It was 100% steam the last time I rode it but the vibration and degree of accent and decent just have to be felt and hopefully would be the same with diesel power. My thanks to cchan006 for rekindling that adventure.