{"id":446,"date":"2008-10-07T21:58:45","date_gmt":"2008-10-08T01:58:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nanosphoto.com\/blog\/2008\/10\/07\/nr-2-lite-a-couple-acelas\/"},"modified":"2008-10-07T21:58:45","modified_gmt":"2008-10-08T01:58:45","slug":"nr-2-lite-a-couple-acelas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nanosphoto.com\/blog\/nr-2-lite-a-couple-acelas\/","title":{"rendered":"NR-2 Lite & a couple Acelas"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Sometimes getting up late is a good thing.\u00a0 Today fell into that category.\u00a0 I slept through my alarm, and got out about an hour later than usual this morning.\u00a0 On my way south to Groton, I had the scanner on, listening to the P&W frequency (I shut off the NECR because I knew they were already in Franklin, and the valley is still in the shadows at this time of day).\u00a0\u00a0 I didn’t catch anything on the scanner until I was pulling off of I-395 in Montville, and pulling onto Route 32.\u00a0 That’s when I heard the dispatcher acknowledge “NR-2 no defects, Jewett City.”\u00a0 OK, NR-2 was in the picture.\u00a0 I guess I’d be a bit later into the office this morning…<\/p>\n

Because of where I was at, I figured my best bet would be to continue south, cross the Thames on the Gold Star, then head back north on Route 12.\u00a0 As I was passing through Ledyard on Route 12, I heard NR-2 report to the dispatcher that they were south of MP12 – about 5 miles to the north.\u00a0 A quick turnaround, and I set my sights on Mill Cove.\u00a0 The water should be quite calm at this time of morning…<\/p>\n

I got to the cove a few minutes later, and was greeted by a smooth-as-glass body of water.\u00a0 So I sat and waited for the usual heads-up call – horns as the train pulled through Dow Chemical a mile to the north.<\/p>\n

About 5 minutes later, the horns carried down the river that mile, and I got into position at the south end of the cove.\u00a0 Of course, by this time the winds started to stir, and slight ripple came across the water.\u00a0 Oh, well, can’t win ’em all.<\/p>\n

A couple minutes passed by, then NR-2 started sounding for the crossing at Red Top, then came into view.\u00a0 Real <\/em>big train today – just light engines.<\/p>\n[cpg_imagefixthumb:7993]\n

Then I got a couple shots as NR-2 scared a seagull into flight<\/p>\n[cpg_imagefixthumb:7992] [cpg_imagefixthumb:7991]\n

And a usual view with the Harvard Boat House in the background<\/p>\n[cpg_imagefixthumb:7990]\n

Then switching to the 20D with the wider lens, a shot over the inlet to the cove<\/p>\n[cpg_imagefixthumb:7989]\n

Next stop would be the Thames River drawbridge.<\/p>\n

A quick check of my schedule showed I had a teleconference in about a half hour.\u00a0 That gave me about 15 minutes of “dwell time” at the parking lot south of the drawbridge.<\/p>\n

After I parked, I noticed something moving – it was a small crane moving a porta-potty on one of the barges<\/p>\n[cpg_imagefixthumb:7988]\n

Then listening to the radio, there were 2 Acelas in the picture before NR-2 could come onto the corridor.\u00a0 First up was a westbound<\/p>\n[cpg_imagefixthumb:7987] [cpg_imagefixthumb:7986]\n

Then an eastbound<\/p>\n[cpg_imagefixthumb:7985] [cpg_imagefixthumb:7984]\n

As the trains cleared the area, there still was no word from the Amtrak New London dispatcher about NR-2, and a look at my watch told me I was out of time.\u00a0 So I packed things up and headed for the office.\u00a0 Just in time to get on the teleconference.\u00a0 Not a bad start to the day…<\/p>\n

Thanks for looking!
\nTom<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sometimes getting up late is a good thing.\u00a0 Today fell into that category.\u00a0 I slept through my alarm, and got out about an hour later than usual this morning.\u00a0 On my way south to Groton, I had the scanner on, listening to the P&W frequency (I shut off the NECR because I knew they were […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[83,13,14,68,21,25,24],"class_list":{"0":"post-446","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-rail_photography","7":"tag-acela","8":"tag-amtrak","9":"tag-connecticut","10":"tag-groton","11":"tag-ledyard","12":"tag-mill-cove","13":"tag-thames-river","14":"czr-hentry"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nanosphoto.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/446","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nanosphoto.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nanosphoto.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nanosphoto.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nanosphoto.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=446"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nanosphoto.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/446\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nanosphoto.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=446"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nanosphoto.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=446"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nanosphoto.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=446"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}