Last night I cranked up my ancient Super 8 Sound projector and ran thru four 40-foot movie reels, including the two from Guatemala - El Salvador, one South Africa (19-D Spooky and Grahamstown), and one reel of the last run on the Clyde branch in Washington State. Amazingly all of the films survived without breakage. I got to re-live the ascent of the Ipala loops which I spent on the tender oil bunker with my movie camera, overlooking the cab roof and boiler during the climb. The only slides I took were at the top trestle as the train exited the approach tunnel. I am attaching these even though I am sure that John West has much better shots here. Anyway, I have decided to mail the Guatemala - El Salvador movies off to get digitized. So here are a few more still shots as our charter train is headed for the loops and the El Salvador border.
A brief water and service stop before reaching the loop area
Engine 183 is receiving some TLC. 183 hauled our charter all the way from Guatemala City, but on the Guatemala - Zacapa section our train also included three box cars of coffee beans (not for consumption by the charter members)
183 was a pretty clean burning engine, so all that smoke during the runby was strictly for the smoke-loving segment of the group. Later, riding on the top of the tender while ascending the Ioops, I much appreciated 183's clear stack
Another runby further up the line
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/27/2021 05:36PM by Olaf Rasmussen.