NNG - #2472 & Pacific Shore Ltd, Day 2 ... more pics from 09/92

Continued from [ngdiscussion.net] -

On 09/13/92, while my Mom, Wife and Daughter Cindy (Jackelopette) rode on the observation
car along with Jim Clark of the Fillmore & Western,* I chased the Pacific Shore Limited south
from San Luis Obispo to Los Angeles.   The morning fog was still pretty heavy at the highway
overpass just beyond Guadalupe when #2472 arrived with her train:


South of Guadalupe the railroad turns west toward Casmalia and the coast but the highway runs inland for about fifty miles before meeting the tracks again at Gaviota, where the trains pass over a long trestle above the beach.**  Here most of the passengers - not all of them were railfans - unloaded for a run-by:


While the passengers re-boarded at Gaviota, I headed a few miles south to the bridge and rest stop at Rio Hondo - one of my favorite photo locations on the entire Coast Line - and climbed the hill between the old road and the freeway.*** In my rush to reload the camera before the train arrived I didn't wind the film quite far enough, and lost the far left of the first image:


Fortunately, #2472 stopped briefly in Santa Barbara to take on water - allowing me to get a couple of miles ahead for one last shot taken hurriedly at Summerland:****


By that time the train was about three hours late, and had been given authority to run at track speed the rest of the way to L.A.  As usual, the freeway through my home town of Ventura was heavy with southbound Sunday evening traffic, so even a stop to unload a few passengers at Oxnard didn't slow the train enough for me to catch her again.

- El Curmudgeono de la Costa del Oro

     * See [ngdiscussion.net].  Tom Rooney of Pacific Pipeline - an S.P. affiliate - had purchased a large block of tickets on the SLO-LA segment of the trip to give a tour of the proposed route of an oil pipeline between Gaviota and Los Angeles along the railroad right-of-way through Ventura and then east through Santa Paula and Fillmore.****   Along with Tom, Jim Clark of the F&W, and several other local citizens, I was involved in the effort to save S.P.'s Santa Paula branch as a multi-use transportation corridor, and had helped Tom make contact with the GGRM to set up his tour. When he saw us in SLO, he immediately upgraded my family's coach tickets and invited them to join him on The Kansas.

   ** Although the S.P. had reached Santa Barbara from L.A. by 1890, and San Luis Obispo from San José by 1894, it wasn't until construction of several of these very large trestles along the rugged coast south of SLO that the railroad was finally completed in 1904.*****

  *** The old concrete highway bridge at Rio Hondo is now a pedestrian-only overlook of the RR trestle and the beach below.  Hopefully if and when #2472 ever comes south on the Coast Line again, Pete Lerro will be there to stage some sunset photos with several late-twenties cars on this bridge ...    

 **** (Added 09/16)  After lunch on the patio of the blatantly 'DOG FRIENDLY' Summerland Café, Bosco and I - and our favorite puppy-sitter, Irish Linda - were on the beach at the far left of this photo just yesterday afternoon.

***** S.P.'s original Coast Line left the valley line at Saugus and headed west to the shoreline at Ventura via Piru, Fillmore and Santa Paula. The branch line from Montalvo south to Oxnard was eventually extended through the Simi Valley and the Santa Susana tunnels to shorten the main line by several miles, so the Montalvo-Saugus route became the Santa Paula branch in 1906.  The Southern Pacific Historical & Technical Society is holding their annual meeting in Ventura this year, and is sponsoring a trip on the entire remaining trackage of the Santa Paula Branch from Montalvo to Piru on Thursday, October 11.  See the SPH&TS website at [www.sphts.org] for details.



Edited 7 time(s). Last edit at 09/17/2012 01:29PM by Russo Loco.