Re: Similar to Easter Island Phantoms

davidtltc Wrote:
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> In my opinion it would be better to have multi-
> ple run-bys in the primo locations of the train
> moving slow through the curve and only allow
> like eight people at a time, if that.


A bit extreme, Dave – IMHO.

Unloading and then reloading only eight at a time would limit your run-bys to two a day – three at most – and with the need to attract 40 to 50 "high-rollers" to buy tickets these days it's rather unlikely you'd ever get enough people to sign up for a charter when they're going to spend four out of every five run-bys hiding in the (well disguised) rider boxcars rather than outside shooting Phraud-O-Graphs™.

There were about thirty of us on the 'Green Jacket Special' in May of 2010.  IIRC we ALL got off the train at Phantom Curve, and JBWX caught a photo similar to this one (he was about ten feet to my right) that was good enough for the cover of Larry Jensen's excellent little book Hollywood's Railroads, Volume Three - Narrow Gauge Country:


There were about the same number of riders (actually, probably quite a few more) on the very first C&TS Phraud-O-Phreight® – The Toltec Rattler of 10/22/72 – and again we all disembarked at Phantom Curve.  I was a LOT younger and sprier back in those days, and scrambled up a scree slope on the hillside for this one:


I tried to replicate it when the August 2010 eastbound freight stopped at Phantom Curve, but couldn't make it up the hill — especially not after Cole Adams – unintentionally, I presume – sent an avalanche in my direction . . .

- El Abuelo Histœrico, Greengo y Curmudgeoño de los Locomoturas Viejos y Verdes,
aka Der Grossväterlich DünkelOlivGrünDampfKesselMantelLiebHabender