At North Pole Station. Engineer Ken Blandina gets the lantern signal from his Conductor that his locomotive has been decoupled from the passenger consist, and he may now pull forward to begin his run-around move. This is the Valley Railroad's North Pole Express Number 1, as it sits in the hole at the North Pole Station....known most of the year as Deep River Landing. NPE-1, as she is called, departed Essex, CT at 5PM and ran all the way to North Chester, before shoving back to Deep River. Moments before this photo was taken, NPE-1 was passed by NPE-2, another North Pole Express Train with VALE 40 on point. Now that the second train is clear of the yard, NPE-1 is free to run around and depart southbound for Essex. From mid-November to the end of December, this two-train evolution is repeated twice per night, six nights a week. Don't go looking for tickets.....there aren't any.....and haven't been for months. This event typically sells out in the fall.
This image is a one-second exposure with available light from the Christmas Display as well as nearby street lights. A fill-flash was also provided courtesy of RP Contributor Paolo Roffo.
A continuously growing album of photos that IMHO reveal the awesome and seldom-seen beauty of the railroad world from the dimming of day to dawn's early light! From dusk to dawn, trains roll on! (I'm still finding gems of sunset-to-sunrise surprises!)
