My niece and April’s granddaughter Stephanie and her husband Justin have started a YouTube Channel called Life with the Stinsons! It’s all about their life with my newest great-great niece Sophia. Check it out and subscribe!!!
I have a core group of about 4 railfan friends; Ryan, Dave, Bill and Bryan, that I hit the road with. This weekend was the first time since a steam train trip to the Tennessee Valley Railroad Museum in Chattanooga back in 2017, that we all five have been on a trip together and we had a great time despite the overcast, dreary and raining weather.
On Saturday March, 9th, 2019 the five of us made a trip to Nashville, Tennessee to see the movement of the NC&StL Steam locomotive at Union Station in downtown Nashville, Tennessee as part of it’s movement by CSX Transportation with it’s renumbered CSXT 576 unit.
After several hours on display the locomotive was then towed on its own wheels to the restoration facility at the Tennessee Central Railway Museum, where it will undergo and estimated two years of restoration. The Nashville, Chattanooga and St. Louis Railway was a railway company operated in the southern United States in Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama and Georgia. It began as the Nashville and Chattanooga Railroad, chartered in Nashville in December 11, 1845, built to 5 ft (1,524 mm) gauge and was the first railway to operate in the state of Tennessee. By the turn of the twentieth century, the NC&StL grew into one of the most important railway systems in the southern United States.
The plan is to run 576 in excursion service out of Nashville once the repairs are complete. Below is a live video I did from Union Station.
This weekend my sister April and I made a quick trip to North Carolina to visit Sophia, my 15th great-great niece/nephew and her 15th great grandchild! It doesn’t seem possible that we have that many, but we are truly blessed beyond our belief that we do!
We have been meaning to make this trip ever since Sophia was born on New Year’s Eve, but we both have had this annoying cough that was going around and takes forever to get over! It took us both about 3 weeks or so! Didn’t want to give her or anyone else the cough!
We headed out on Friday morning, trying to keep ahead of the bad weather the forecasters said was coming our way and heading for the Carolina’s. Fortunately we were able to do just that going both ways, only running into a little rain on the return trip Sunday the 13th. The trip over took us about 10 hours with gas, food and photo stops occasionally along the way. Can’t make a trip without photo stops and of course this includes a train or two during the trip!
I guess we got checked into the hotel around 9pm or so and then headed on over to Jamie’s, Stephanie’s mom, and Sophia’s YaYa (YaYa is a popular Greek grandmother nickname and yes, I had to ask!) for our first visit with Stephanie and Justin’s daughter Sophia ! Of course neither of us were disappointed as she was awake, alert and beautiful!
We had a great visit Friday night and then headed back over Saturday morning to continue visiting her and everyone else. Since Jamie was hosting a Kitchen Party for a bunch of ladies, just about all the guys escaped to other locations and I used the opportunity to find a few trains to photograph in Monroe and at the I-485 metro stop!
I got back to the house just as the party was breaking up and had enough time to meet and greet some of the folks I met and saw at Stephanie and Justin’s wedding. It was nice to catch up! We all sat around and nibbled on the foods they made during the kitchen party before everything broke up.
Afterwards we headed out with Stephanie and Sophia to meet up with Justin for dinner before heading back to our motel for the night. Poor guy had to work during our visit! (I remember those days and don’t miss them!!) We actually went to three different restaurants (all had long waiting lists) before we settled on waiting at a Texas Roadhouse for about 20 minutes to get a table. It was well worth the wait though as all our food was great and we had a great time of visiting before heading in for the night as we planned on leaving for home early Sunday morning.
Sunday morning we got away early so I could stop by the train yard at Charlotte, NC from a bridge on the north end that Wally had told me about. It was a great view and I was able to get several nice shots of rail action before we hit the road back to Kentucky.
On the way home I kept watching for a spot where I could stop in the mountains and get a shot of the river as it ran through them. I passed up a couple spots because it was raining fairly hard, but finally found a spot at Cosby, TN.
All in all it was a good trip, despite it being too short and we finally arrived safely back home at a decent hour without any really bad weather!
Right now our next planned long trip is to Chicago for a concert in March! Stay tuned!!
On June 23rd, 2018 Sis and I made an overnight road trip to Cane Ridge, Kentucky, which is the birthplace of the Disciples of Christ Church movement in the early 1800’s, which we belong to as do many others in our family.
It was interesting to see and walk around the grounds of the Cane Ridge Meeting house and to see how well the site has been preserved!
Below is a video I did from the morning session, I hope you all enjoy.
This past weekend my good friend Ryan Scott from the Ft. Branch, Indiana area and I set-out on a day-long trip to photograph trains between Princeton, Indiana and what started out to be Louisville, Ky, but turned out to be La Grange, Ky. Our plan was to meet up with a fellow railfan friend of ours from Facebook, Javid Beykzadeh. Little did I realize that I’d end up meeting several more friends from Facebook while we were at it including, Adam Hill, Josh Kellerman, and Erik Landrum.
The railfanning community is actually fairly large, if you take in the world and that’s pretty much what Facebook does for us. I have friends who are railfans from pretty much all over the world and it’s always cool to meetup in person in our travels in search of that perfect train picture!
All my family already know my obsession with trains and photographing them whenever I can. Even, my nieces and nephews know about my love for trains, and I hope that I’m passing some of that onto them, but I digress.
As railfan trips go, this was a really good one with Ryan and I photographing 5 different railroads before the day was over. Evansville Western Railway, CSX, Norfolk Southern, Indiana Southern Railway and Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway. As day road trips go for me railfanning, this was a really good one!
Other favorite photos of mine from our day-long trip are posted below.
June 9, 2018 – There’s just something about the lure of street running trains and when you throw in a BNSF War Bonnet, well, it makes it even better. Here we have a southbound CSX Q231-08 as begins to make it’s way through downtown La Grange toward Louisville, Ky.
June 9, 2018 Norfolk Southern Heritage Unit 8099, “Southern” passes the signal at milepost 209.8, at Jefferson Township, Indiana, as it makes its way west on the NS Southern-East District. This scheme is from the Southern Railway (GE) which originated as the South Carolina Canal and Rail Road Company in 1827. On Christmas Day, 1830, it put into service the nation’s first regularly scheduled steam passenger train, “The Best Friend of Charleston.” Southern was incorporated in 1894 from the reorganization and consolidation of numerous predecessors, and absorbed another 68 railroad companies over the next six years.
June 9, 2018 – Here we find a crew getting NS Heritage 8099, Southern Unit, ready for pickup by an, Duke Energy coal train, at the NS Yard Office in Princeton, Indiana, after storms passed through the area. We got lots of great photographs, which you’ll see over the days to come and also met-up with several fellow railfans in person that we’ve been friends with on Facebook for sometime!
June 9, 2018 Norfolk Southern Heritage Unit 8099, “Southern” passes the signal at milepost 209.8, at Jefferson Township, Indiana, as it makes its way west on the NS Southern-East District. This scheme is from the Southern Railway (GE) which originated as the South Carolina Canal and Rail Road Company in 1827. On Christmas Day, 1830, it put into service the nation’s first regularly scheduled steam passenger train, “The Best Friend of Charleston.” Southern was incorporated in 1894 from the reorganization and consolidation of numerous predecessors, and absorbed another 68 railroad companies over the next six years.