Before the Snow

This afternoon I was able to sneak out of work a little early (with permission, of course) and venture out to see what was moving on the CN. I knew there was a northbound coming up the hill, and it looked like something headed south on the Rainy Sub too. 

As I reached Highway 2 at the Morris Thomas Road intersection, I was greeted by the passage of the lone locomotive at the head of the train. After a right turn, I managed to get in position for a shot at Munger, but the clouds made it a pretty blah attempt. 

So I swung over to Simar for a peek up the tracks, which revealed a train on the main with the headlight off. Not being sure what that meant, I ran down to Adolph and considered waiting for another train coming up the hill, but the clouds were still pretty thick. Some blue sky to the west inspired me to backtrack. A glance at ATCS revealed that the train at Simar now had a light so I headed back there for this shot.

Headlight was on now! With that one bagged, I checked the status of the next northbound and found he was close to Adolph already. With the sun peeking through the clouds from time to time now, I decided to try Canosia Road for the final shot of the day. A wonderful sucker hole appeared and I opened fire at long range, getting this.

And then the sun slipped behind a cloud, which resulted in the bland image below. If it was just a couple of GE's I wouldn't mind so much, but a pair of SD75's up front is not so common. Would have liked to have had the sucker hole here.

Feeling frustrated and with nothing close by on the radar, I headed for home. Still, can't be too disappointed seeing 3 in a long hour. It was better than staring at outlook and Microsoft Teams, for sure. Maybe tomorrow there will be first snow shots to get.

Fall's Last Gasp

 It's been a lovely autumn here in the Twin Ports, with leaf color that has brought people from all over the state to take in the view. This has inspired me to get out and chase trains every time the opportunity presented itself, and Sunday afternoon was one such opportunity. 

ATCS showed a train headed toward Carlton from the range. I figured there was plenty of time to intercept it there, and possibly chase it for another shot or two. By the time I arrived at the crossing in town, and looked at ATCS again, I was pleasantly surprised to see a train waiting at a red light somewhere in the Cloquet area and another lined off the Brainerd Sub. Off I went, searching for a suitable backdrop for not one but two on the BNSF. The heavy overcast at least kept me from worrying about sun angles. I settled for the crossing at Lerner Road, where a short wait for the coal loads yielded this. (Right click and open in new tab for full resolution.)

I was wishing for the ACe to be up front, but no such luck. So I decided to wait here for the train from the range in the hopes it was pellets, and sure enough it was. Plus, this one had a pair of ACe's on the point.

I had moved across the tracks in order to give chase, and caught the train again at State Line. My framing is rusty but I did manage to catch one of the remaining spots of color here.

With that, Mrs. L4T and myself headed to Superior for a drive through supper at Hardees, home of the the thickburger. After a long spell of CN red and black, it was nice to catch the orange of BNSF once again. And a pair of ACe's always beats a three GE's in my book. This outing probably marked the end of any kind of fall color as a storm moved through the area overnight and knocked a lot of leaves down. So now we wait for the white stuff to add its mark to the local scenery.