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It was a rare morning. I was off from work, the kids were at school, and I had time on my hands. As luck would have it, my railfan / model railroad buddy also had time off, and I had arranged to meet him at his home to “work” (yeah, right!) on his HO scale model railroad that morning. I had not planned to do any railfanning, but I had my camera with me just in case.

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Heading south along the former B&O Toledo Division, I came upon a CSX northbound waiting for a signal at Trent – geographically it’s actually Busenbark, but we’ll use the railroad name here. A train waiting here was not unusual, but the lead unit was. It was a Santa Fe “Warbonnet”, untouched by BNSF save for a small “BNSF” patch under the cab. HO scale would wait!

As I turned around to get ahead of my prize, a southbound stack train whizzed by – surely what the Santa Fe was waiting for – so I pulled up to the main and waited. And waited. And waited.

Actually, it was no more than fifteen minutes, but it seemed like an eternity. Then, I heard a new horn in the distance. Oh well, I guess I’d have to wait a bit longer for the Santa Fe. The new train was coming quickly. Very quickly! I set up and clicked off my photos of a CSX SD70MAC and a former Canadian National and Union Pacific “rent-a-wreck” SD-40-2. The duo blew past with a manifest freight. Not bad, but not what I was waiting for.

I texted my friend about the Santa Fe. He would understand why I would be late.

Then, finally, a headlight, a horn, and movement. The Santa Fe Dash 9 still displayed the class of its fallen flag owner. It looked great in the morning light. Not even the ugly-as-sin CSX “SD-40-3” trailing behind could diminish its elegance. The moment was captured!

It was time for model railroading where I would go on to somehow accidentally reprogram the DCC decoder on a locomotive, rendering it useless. Oh well, at least I had better luck with the real thing that day!



Now, go watch some trains!

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