East Into the Blues

by Steve Eshom

With friends from California in tow I headed east to help Robert show off the Blues.   We made a few stops in the gorge at places along the UP that I’d never visited.   Its amazing how many times I’ve driven through the gorge and have never stopped at some of these fabulous locations. 

Between Biggs and Rufus

As train traffic in the gorge petered out (and the local out of The Dalles derailed at Hood River) we headed to Kamela summit for what was a reasonably busy afternoon.  It was really fun to see and hear the excitement as the foreign guests witnessed their first train topping over amid the Tamarck’s changing for the season.  The 10,000ft long stack train didn’t hurt anything either.  

Topping over Kamela Summit

After a night in LaGrande we headed over Telocaset in mixed fog and sun.  The Baker valley always seems to deliver good light in the morning!  The last train on the pass was a westbound inspection train after which we ended our brief tour of the Blues.

Nothing like North Powder in the morning!

Technorati Tags: trains, railroad, railfan, photos, photography, blue mountains, the blues, union pacific

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 5th, 2009 at 7:28 pm and is filed under trip reports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.