pleased
For me, the feature attraction was to see the newly-restored steam locomotive Glenbrook. Lisa was here the day they officially unveiled her to the public after years of rebuilding.
Glenbrook was a narrow-gauge logging locomotive used in the Lake Tahoe basin. It was used on several narrow-gauge railroads including the Nevada County Narrow Gauge before being reacquired by the family of the original owner, then put on display for many years in front of the Nevada State Museum in Carson City.
Years of neglect sitting on display left the Nevada State Railroad Museum with quite a task when they set out to restore the locomotive to working order, and it wasn't their top priority, either. However, after many years of work, they have restored it to as close to its original operating configuration as they could. It's a beautiful job.
It's also a rather small locomotive. I wish there was something in this shot of the inside of the locomotive's cab to give you some scale.
As arranged while we were there, Glenbrook sets almost nose-to-nose with standard-gauge Virginia & Truckee locomotive 22, Inyo. It's not obvious from this shot standing on a platform next to the Glenbrook, but Inyo is much bigger, and not just because it's a standard-gauge locomotive.
Outside, at the Wabuska platform (the former Wabuska station on the SP Mina Subdivision, restored as the passenger platform for the museum train), V&T #25 was steamed up for the holiday weekend.
Our museum membership entitles us to 2-for-1 rides on the excursion train. We had the choice of riding Nevada Copper Belt caboose #3 (historically accurate recreation) ...
...V&T passenger coach #10...
...or the open-air tunnel inspection car, V&T 53, fitted out with seats. We choose the "tunnel car."
Lisa spent time on the platform discussing the mechanical details of the cars with museum volunteers, as is her wont. If we had more time and/or Carson City was a little closer, I can see Lisa ending up as a volunteer here.
The trip around the museum grounds is two laps on the loop, after which the train heads into "Hobo Hollow," a siding where the locomotive runs around the train.
Here's a short video of #25 backing onto our train. (Click through to watch the video.)
After our trip around the grounds, I went wandering, and then set up to get this video of the #25 making its next trip. This video was pretty good until the very end, when a bee landed on me and recording was disrupted by me taking evasive action.
I managed to avoid getting stung, moved somewhere the bee lost interest in me, and got another shot as the train came along for a second pass. Incidentally, in case you're wondering, they cut off the "tunnel car" before making this trip, which was their last run of the day.
I took a peek inside the backshop before making a brief visit to the bookstore inside the museum and adding yet another volume to our collection of train books.
We had an entertaining afternoon at the museum, for only the cost of driving over to Carson City as we are museum members. As I mentioned yesterday, I offered to make the Labor Day weekend a "staycation rail trifecta" by riding the Virginia & Truckee Railroad on Monday, but the first two days of railfanning were enough and instead we were responsible homeowners and worked around Fernley House doing cleaning chores.
It is pretty nifty having two decent railroad museums (one of which, Portola, bills itself as the largest by area in North America) within an easy drive of our home, a historic route (the V&T) also nearby, and of course the ongoing show right across the street from our house.