All Aboard!

Saturday, June 6 – Today was a big day: A full day excursion on the historic Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad. We had originally wanted to do one of their adventure packages, which included a several-hour-long zipline tour through the Ponderosa pine treetops. However, when we looked at the weather forecast the day before, it looked pretty bad with high winds and thunderstorms in the forecast. So, we decided not to book it. We ended up regretting that decision the next morning, when it was sunny and pleasant at 8:30am. That was a bummer, but the day was still great.

We literally took about 300 pictures as the train cut through Animas River valley along the rocky cliffs. The train took 3-1/2 hours to get to Silverton, which is about a 46 mile trip. We went about the same speed as it did back when the railroad opened in 1881 – no faster than 18 mph. However, you didn’t really want it to go very much faster, since everyone was hanging out the windows trying to take the perfect picture.

This video captured one of the more picturesque moments of the train ride.

And for whatever reason, there is some sort of biological urge to wave at a train when it passes by. No matter who you are, young or old, trains are just fun.