492 and 498 La Boca to Florida mesa, June 2, 1966

After watering both engines at La Boca, the train headed up the Los Pinos river valley toward Ignacio. This section of the chase offered some excellent pacing on the parallel gravel road, with the engines working upgrade at a good pace. Sound recordings would have been awesome. The Alamosa - Durango line offered some great pacing. Foremost of all, of course, was on the three rail track from Alamosa to Antonito. The second outstanding pacing opportunity was on the track relocation along the Navajo reservoir. The grade out of La Boca came in third. There was a fourth, but shorter, pacing opportunity on Florida mesa on the last couple of miles leading to Falfa.

Here 492 and 498 are setting a good pace on the straight track out of La Boca



After four miles the road and railroad start to diverge, and we headed off to the top of Florida mesa to allow time to hike to the big S-curve that I had seen in Frank Barry's photo



This big S-curve was our next objective. It is on the 1.42 percent grade climb out of the Florida river valley. This photo was taken by Frank Barry a few years before, and I posted it once in connection with a posting on unsafe acts on the narrow gauge (the blurry nature of the scan is due to my scanner not being able to handle 11x14 prints). I still consider it one of my favorite views on the narrow gauge. Since I wasn't sure of the exact location of this S-curve, we decided to park where the grade emerges from the valley slope and turns on to the Florida mesa, and to hike down the RR tracks. We were hoping that the engines would take water at the Florida tank to gives us a little extra time, but I suspect that they rolled right through. We finally made it to the S-curve after hiking a bit over a mile, getting there none too soon, and with no time to scout out an optimal location. The other problem was the lateness of the afternoon with long shadows.



Here is my photo of the approaching train - in no way a match to Frank Barry's magnificent photograph.



As the engines were laboring up the grade and the train's speed was fairly low, I had the brilliant idea of hitching a ride on an idler flat car to the top of the grade, saving a mile of hiking.
The result was of course predictable. I grabbed the hand rail, couldn't get my feet on the step, and ended up hanging from the hand rail, facing backwards, with my legs bouncing next to the rotating meat cleavers. Unable to see where we were going, I finally let go, hoping not to bounce into the wheels or into rock. Just about the dumbest thing I have ever done, but I did survive, although seriously shaken by my narrow escape from disaster. Steve and John watched all this in amazement.



By the time I had recovered some composure and we had hiked back to the car, the train and light were both gone, and we headed back to Chama for the next day's adventures

(to be continued)