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Camping, back roads and trains

Dan and Dawn's Arizona Adventures

Or, "Sure we can make it through here without getting stuck".

Well, my husband Dan, and I, Dawn, haven't gone on many back roads in Arizona, but we have gone to see and ride passenger trains. The National Railway Historical Society's annual National Convention was held in August 2002 in Williams, AZ. We revisited Nebraska, Colorado and New Mexico on the way, and saw many of the places that we had seen in May that year.

Williams, Arizona is up in the mountains, so the midday temperatures are very comfortable in August. It is also the headquarters of the Grand Canyon Railway, which runs passenger trains to the south rim of Grand Canyon National Park. It is a former Sante Fe Railroad line.

Two different excursions ran to the Grand Canyon during the Convention.

We rode the excursion trip that ran at the beginning of the week. It used diesel locomotives, and ran specifically to be at the Canyon in time to see the sunset. The left photo shows passengers boarding the train at the historic train station in Williams, AZ. A caboose and steam locomotive are on permanent display next to the station. In the middle of the trip, the train stopped and we were allowed to get off and photograph the train for a "photo runby". It allowed the photographers a chance to see and photograph/video record the train in action, before reboarding and continuing with the ride.

The trip schedule gave us enough time to visit the historic buildings, shop and eat dinner, as well as see the sunset before reboarding the train and returning to Williams. This Native American bird decoration was in the building where we ate an excellent dinner.

After sunset but before it was time to reboard, we were standing on the sidewalk by the artist's building (Kolb Studio) when we heard something rustling below us. One of the other passengers had a flashlight, and it turned out to be a deer walking on the path that was off-limits to people. It was browsing on branches, and not concerned about us at all. I'm sure it was used to people, and that it knew that we couldn't get near it.

That was a very nice day.

Another Convention event we attended was an excursion ride on the Verde Canyon Railway. The line runs through some spectacular scenery along the Verde River canyon from Clarkdale to Perkinsville. A guide gives a running narration during the trip, and points out the eagles if in sight, and the ancient Native American ruins in the cliffs above the train. The station at the end of the line has appeared in some old-time Western movies. They mentioned specific movies, but I didn't make note of them and don't remember their names. Maybe someone can tell me their names. My e-mail address is at the bottom of the page.

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We found a gravel road that led to the area where the previous Grand canyon trip had stopped to do the photo runby. The steam trains did several runbys there, which took at least an hour. They had left Williams before the heat of the day, but by the time the trains stopped to do the runbys, it was noticeably warm. We had to make sure the Jeep didn't overheat while we waited. It was worth the wait. First they did a runby with just one locomotive on the train. They then added a second locomotive, and did more runbys. The white specks in the photo are the people from the train lined up to take photos.

I had to use an 80-200mm zoom telephoto lens, a 2X teleconverter and a tripod to take the photos. The heat wave shimmers were starting to get noticeable on the very distant photos; they were not so prominent on the closer ones. Yes, I know you're not supposed to use a teleconverter on a zoom lens, but I have a VERY good lens and I wanted to try the setup. I think some of the photos turned out alright. Dan took this photo of me photographing the train and people.

When the passengers were reboarding the train, Dan and I drove to Grand Canyon National Park. It was the best $20 we spent on the whole trip. The star of the show, steam locomotive Sante Fe #3751, was brought by its crew all the way from its home in California for the Convention. The locomotive was pulled up in front of the historic train station for posed photos. Eventually two steam locomotives from the Grand Canyon Railway joined it to make a very rare and special photo opportunity.

One of the photos is at the upper left of this web page. Here are some others:

The line-up in front of the historical old timber station was quite a sight.

The photographers' line-up was also a sight. Most people were pretty good about staying out of the way of others.

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While we were there, we went to see the Desert View Watchtower. It's on the eastern end of the South rim, and we stopped before leaving the Park. The National Park Service's web site says that it was built in 1932. There are some very interesting murals/drawings on the walls and ceilings.

              This is one of the murals.

You can see some interesting views of the Canyon from the upper floors of the Tower.

The next day, a special passenger excursion train led by steam locomotive Sante Fe #3751 left to return to California. This is what it looked like when it left Williams, AZ.

The Convention was over, so we left for home with our Scamp in tow. We visited the Four Corners area of Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico and Utah. Of course we took photos of the place.

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