Friday – P&W NR-2 and Amtrak 190

OK, part III of my catching up series – some shots from yesterday. I was able to get out yesterday and actually catch Providence & Worcester train NR-2 in Ledyard, taking advantage of the sunlight before the clouds rolled in later in the day. And as it worked out, I caught an Amtrak regional over the Thames River on my way back to the office.

A hole appeared in my schedule Friday morning, so I made my way back out to the parking lot, hoping I could catch NR-2 somewhere. Ideally, I was shooting for somewhere in Ledyard, but as usual, I’d take what I could get. So as I climbed in the car, I fired up the scanner, and hit the P&W and Amtrak frequencies.

Just as I began to leave the parking lot, the P&W frequency locked in with the Worcester dispatcher amending NR-2s Form D, giving them the track between milepost 13 and 5. Well, that meant a couple things – first they were somewhere north of 13, but also that a track car was in the area, south of 5. So before they got to 5, they’d have to get that track as well. Maybe I could make it up into Ledyard, and possibly to milepost 7. So that’s where I set my sights.

Well, I did get there ahead of the train, so I started looking around. I wanted to do something different here – I’ve done shots around the tidal pool to the east of the tracks, and shot from the shadow side of the tracks too. Something else caught my eye – a telephoto shot of the train leaning through the curve at the north side of the tidal pool. But the only problem was there were about a dozen branches in the way of the shot.

Just then, the scanner woke up with Rod reporting that NR-2 was south of MP12, and about 15 minutes from the sub base. Now what to do? Do I settle for a shot I already got? Nope, I do what any good Boy Scout would do – get out my Leatherman, extract the saw, and do a bit of, eh, landscaping.

Just as I was pruning the last branch, NR-2 started blowing for the crossing at the old Norwich Hospital a couple miles to the north in Preston. Not long after that, I dusted the sawdust off of me and the camera, and got a shot of the train heading over the Preston/Ledyard town line.

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A few moments later, the train came rolling along, and into view

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Then the shots I wanted – the train pulling through the curve. I got one tight shot as the power was entering the curve, with the train visible behind it

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And a wider shot, getting the river also in the shot.

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About 15 cars later, I got a shot of the trailing power heading for me

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Then a shot of the entire train rolling along the Thames, clearing milepost 7

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And as the train rolled out of sight, I climbed the hill back to the car. Maybe I could get down to the Thames River drawbridge in time to catch them crossing the Thames.

I did end up catching up with the train at Fairview, but from the sounds of things, they were going to be doing a bit of switching in the yard before heading onto the Shore Line. So my first stop was the boat launch on the north side of the drawbridge for a shot of the new Thames River drawbridge lift span.

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As I climbed back in the car, the Amtrak frequency locked in with train 190 getting ready to leave the station. So I flipped to the south side of the bridge to get a couple shots of the train heading across the river.

Before the train got there, I got a shot of a fishing boat heading out to sea

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Just then, 190 started across the bridge, and I got a couple frames.

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At that point, NR-2 was still switching, and 171 still hadn’t hit the Midway detector – Shore Line told NR-2 that they’d be following them west. So I put the camera back in the bag and headed back for work.

Thanks for looking!
Tom