Summertime distractions

For most of us, even us Californians, our model building time during the summer months is impacted by doing the things that we can only do in the summer.  For my wife and I, one of those things is getting in a few camping trips.  Northern California offers many great places to camp and one of our favorites is the Sierra Nevada Mountains.  Recently we visited the Feather River Canyon near the town of Clio, home of the Clio Trestle on the Union Pacific line that was once known as Western Pacific's "Feather River Route".

Here's the view from under the Clio Trestle, about half a mile from where we were camped.  Standing under it was a little creepy to hear the occasional "pop" sounds as the steel heated up in the morning sun after a 45 degree low at night.




No train passed over the trestle while we were right there, but of course as soon as we got back to camp  one did.  We could hear about 6 to 8 trains go by each day we were there and from our campsite we could see a bit of the trains between the trees and at night the headlights of the engines.

We were only about 15 miles from the Western Pacific Railroad Museum in Portola.  It had been 10 years since I had been there so I sent a good part of one day there.  One of the great things about this museum is that they let you climb into just about everything.



As I was there on a week day, they did not have anything running but on the weekends they to have excursions.   It's well worth a visit.