Rio Grande Explorations

Hell Week

October 14-20, 2019

Saltville/Abingdon, VA - Wyoming/Botavia, NY - Camping in Tomball

Ennis Railroad Museum - Rease's Wedding - Dallas Aquarium

In Marine Corps recruit training (boot camp), high school marching band, and Drum & Bugle Corps there is always a "hell week" where you run yourself into the ground trying to accomplish tasks and complete training. This week wasn't "hell" per se, but the pace and breadth of the activities taxed me well into my energy reserves and it took me 2 weeks to get caught up on rest.

First up: a work trip to Virginia and up-state New York. We left Monday morning and flew to Tri-Cities, TN. From there we drove to Saltville, VA for our first work project. It's been several years (not long enough) since I last flew and it's just as ridiculous and de-humanizing as it used to be. It will be a LONG time before I do that again... if ever.

While this week was exhausting, I got to do quite a bit of railroad archeology. I felt a bit like Robert W Richardson.

Mr. Richardson worked for a tire company after serving in the Army during WWII. His job allowed him to travel all over the south and while doing this he documented scores of obscure railroads that would've been lost to history except for his efforts. He later moved to Colorado and started collecting locomotives, rolling stock, and boxcar loads of paperwork from railroads that were being abandoned through the 1950's. In the 1970's he took all of this material and founded the Colorado Railroad Museum.

To say that I hold Mr. Richardson in high regards is a woeful understatement. I've been blessed over the past decade to make many work trips that afforded me the opportunity to do my own bit of railroad archeology.

View from the office in Saltville, VA.

Not bad.

The office and plant.

We spent the night at The Martha in Abingdon.

All I gotta to say is WOW.

After checking in, I took a hike to find the Abingdon Depot and the Virginia Creeper trail.

Didn't take long to locate the Depot.

Mission #1: Accomplished.

Now... where's that trail?

I walked back past the hotel to the east side of town where the trail started.

At the head of the trail is an N&W locomotive. I didn't know this was there and was pleasantly surprised.

At the trail head is an old trestle.

The trail is built upon the ROW of the Virginia Western Coal & Iron Railroad Company that was abandoned in 1977.

It runs 34 miles from Abingdon to Damascus, VA.

Mission #2: Accomplished

Heading back to the hotel.

Hotel Promenade

View from the front of the hotel.

Dinner at The Tavern

The steaks and beers were phenomenal.

Tuesday morning we went back to the office in Saltville to wrap up. On our way out, we spotted a local.

After leaving Saltville, we raced north towards Batavia, New York.

En route, we spotted these guys that have begun their journey to Thanksgiving dinner.

Western New York State

We arrived at the hotel late and crashed hard. It was a LONG day of driving.

Wednesday morning we drove to the office in Wyoming, NY.

We hit problems that morning and ran to the Ace Hardware in Attica. While looking for the Ace, I spotted this old building and grabbed a shot.

It was undoubtedly served by rail at one time.

Driving back to the office through the very pretty western New York countryside.

We worked a LONG day and got back to the hotel about 2100. We found a great little pub to get Buffalo wings and beer.

Seemed fitting since we were so close to Buffalo.

We were finished a day early. So my coworker, Mike, tried to get our flight rescheduled. The booking company wanted a stupid amount of money to do this. So, we decided to go to the airport the next morning and attempt to fly back on standby.

However, early the next morning we got texts that our flight was leaving in 2 hours. As we scrambled to get to the airport, we determined that the booking company had actually moved the flight, inadvertently, and didn't charge us. WOO HOO!!!

While this was great news, it would be the last good news for the day. I'll spare the details. In short: it took 14 hours to get home and in my backpack I had 17 different boarding passes. It was a not a good day.

Just before our final flight to Houston, from Chicago, we got some absolutely incredible pizzas from Wolfgang Puck. Words don't do this justice...

However... the day had one more "gotcha" before it was done. I had the very last seat on the plane; all the way in the back and against the window. The seats were 3 across. At first this wasn't so bad. The guy on the aisle even remarked how comfortable it was with no one in the middle. I settled in with my book and then... he arrived. This dude was no less than 400 pounds. Quite possibly 450. He spilled over into both the aisle seat and mine. I was, quite literally, WEDGED between this guy and the window... and I spent nearly 3 hours in this position.

In boot camp, I learned how to disengage my brain to get through the more stressful situations. I don't use that trick much these days because I prefer to deal with adversity head on. But, I had no choice in this situation. So... CLICK... off went the brain.

I got home after midnight.

I utterly detest flying.

Very cool display in O'Hare Airport.

Cockpit of the plane that got me back to Houston. I grabbed the photo for Noah.

The following morning (Friday), I worked from home. That evening, Noah and I went camping with his Trail Life Troop.

Chel left that afternoon for Ennis because a mutual buddy from high school was getting married the next day and

she went up early for the rehearsal dinner while the boys went out to the woods.

Gathering around the camp fire with the Troop at the camp site on Spring Creek in Tomball.

Our fire and tent.

We cooked up some 'dogs.

The next morning I quickly broke camp and packed up. After loading the truck we went for a walk in woods.

Noah really didn't want to go home, but we needed to get back, unpack, shower, repack, get dressed and then drive 3 hours to Ennis.

I was really fighting fatigue by this point.

Many hours later, we arrived at the wedding venue. However, we were 2 hours early and almost no one was there. Knowing how my 5 year old would likely behave after being bored for this length of time, I desperately started looking for something to do. Then, I remembered seeing a mention of a railroad museum in Ennis on TrainOrders.com a while back. A quick internet search revealed that it did, indeed, exist and was open!

So, off we went!