Today, we went to Hill City, to visit the Train Museum and to ride the 1880 Train to Keystone, S.D. and back. The train museum was first and it was small, but very informative. I saw a few things I have never seen or noticed, before today.
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| The first view of the outside from the parking lot. |
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| Dinah viewing a period dress and the Velocimobile to the left. |
I did not show a picture of it here, but there was a timeline shown on the wall all the way around the museum with the history of the steam engine and train transportation. There was a period caboose, along with other memorabilia. The trains that are being used in service and some on display on the grounds were used in some very famous movies. Too many to list here.
They had an impressive display of miniature trains with dioramas to scale that were quite impressive. There were at least three trains that were operating as Dinah discovered. You press a magic button and everything comes to life for five minutes. Really neat. I can't help it. I'm like many men who are frustrated train enthusiasts. I've always loved toy trains!
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Dinah discovered the magic button for us to watch the trains! |
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| A couple of the trains. |
One little note that we learned about from the custodian of the museum had to do with signals used on the railroad. When we were leaving the caboose, Dinah noticed that the box over the door had a label that read "Fussee" on the left and "Torpedoes" on the right. Our curiosity got the better of us and we called the curator to help us out. He explained that the "FUSSEE" was like a little flare that they would use to warn any oncoming train of danger or something on the track. But, "TORPEDOES"? He explained that those were like little charges of dynamite that they would lay on the track so that when the engine rolled over them it would make a huge bang and alert the engineer to trouble ahead! He politely explained that he couldn't have any examples laying around as it would invite mischief! You think? Great guy, great story. It was a very interesting museum. You can see more pictures, here.
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| If you look over the door, you'll see a little box labeled fusees and torpedoes!! |
The next item was the main event. We picked up our tickets at the office and since we had an hour before the train left, we went and had lunch and the depot snack shop. I had a pulled pork sandwich (Sorry, no pics!) and Dinah has a chili cheese dog (her favorite).
We took a few pics of the grounds and got in line and boarded when they gave us the go ahead. We sat in one of the open air cars. No windows, just open sides. A few pictures are below.
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| Leaving the station! What a day! |
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| The open air cars. They had cars with windows that were more period correct, but we opted for this car. |
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| We saw probably a dozen or so deer and fawns along the way. All white tail. They said we might see mule deer, but we didn't. |
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| These are original telegraph poles from the 1800's that still have old wire and insulators on them, but not in use anymore. |
Below is a good shot of the engine swapping ends of the train for the return trip to Hill City. The engineer sat on the window sill all the way back to Hill City. Dinah thought this was really something and kept trying to get a shot of him with the train moving, but we didn't get one, so this is the best we have.
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| Engine that took us to Keystone and back to Hill City. |
Well, that's about it. We were tired again when we got back to Hill City, so we took our time with a nice quiet ride back to the campground and a quick nap! I'm getting used to these afternoon naps!!!
More Train Ride Pictures, here.
Tomorrow, we are going to go into town and shoot some buffalo!! I'll explain tomorrow!
LUV 2 U All!! Until tomorrow!
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