My earliest memory of real trains goes back to the late 1940’s and early 1950’s, when my parents owned and operated a citrus farm. We had forty acres planted in Ruby Red Grapefruit, Naval and Valencia oranges, tangerines and kumquats (kumquats are tiny, ornamental sour oranges).  At first, my parents sold fruit to the local distributors. Then they decided to sell directly to customers all over the US using my grandfather as a salesperson since he traveled all over selling fishing tackle.

    To accommodate this business strategy, my parents built a three-car garage and the back of the garage to house a citrus cleaning and packing plant. The cleaning machine consisted of a number of brush rollers that cleaned and buffed the skin of the fruit. At the end of this cleaning machine, a conveyor moved the fruit to hoppers. A packer worked at each hopper to cull out unsatisfactory fruit, individually wrap each piece of fruit in red or green tissues and place each piece into a shipping basket. Red and green colors were selected because the harvest was in the fall and the fruit would arrive in time for the Holiday Season.

    It was so exciting to hear the big motors start and to watch everything operate. It was such a flurry of activity and the smell of freshly cleaned citrus was so good. One or two workers would load from picking sacks onto the roller of the machine. The citrus would roll and tumble down the rollers to the end where another work would cull unsatisfactory fruit out and direct the fruit on the conveyors to the individual hoppers. A diverter bar guided the fruit from the conveyor to the hopper. When the hopper filled, the diverter bar was moved to the next hopper. When that batch of fruit was completed and all the baskets were labeled, my Dad loaded his pickup, the "silver Streak" and off to the train depot we would go. What possessed my Dad to hand paint his pickup silver I will never know but my Mom thought it was so ugly, she would not ride in it. I thought it was "neat" and I loved riding in the Sliver Streak". Anyway, we drove into Donna, Texas to the train depot, right up beside the refer boxcar. Dad handed the baskets up to the train worker loading the car. When he emptied the pickup, we drove back to the farm for more until we filled all the orders or ran out of fruit.

    This memory is vague but I remember the giant of a loudly hissing steam locomotive. I think it may have been something like a 2-4-0 or a 2-6-0 configuration. I have looked at many pictures of locomotives hoping to connect my memory with some locomotive but I cannot…I sure wish that memory were stronger.

    On one trip, probably the last on for a given day, my Dad showed me the icehouse near by. My memories are somewhat limited but I remember that it was rather dark and quite cold inside. We walked along catwalks just inches above the brine and the brined made me think of the smell of the beach on the Gulf of Mexico 40-50 miles away. Down in the brine were containers filled with water turning to blocks of ice.

    The icehouse is long gone and so it the depot, but those dim memories are holding on.

    Growing up in the Lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas, I led a rather sheltered life and was very much unaware of the big city. Ice, for example, came out of the freezer section of a refrigerator and snow came from Christmas stories out of books. My grandparents on my Mom’s side of the family lived in Dallas, Texas, which for all I knew was the largest city in the whole world. I visited my grandparents about once a year or so. Their house was about a half-block from the 7^th street streetcar line in Oak Cliff. I loved to walk the half-block to watch the streetcars go by. I loved to hear the bell clang as it neared the corner. I also remember the smell of the trees along 7^th street back then. Most of all I loved to hear the low, grinding noise the electric motors made as they went by. You can hear those wonderful noises if you go to the lower McKinney area near downtown Dallas where they run today.

    When I could scare up a penny, I would lay it on the track to let a streetcar run over it. The flattened penny would grow to about the diameter of a quarter and I thought I was somehow richer.

    A story my Mom told about my brother was always fun to hear her tell. My brother would sneak out of my grandparent’s house and go to the streetcar line. He stood there and blocked a streetcar from passing. The conductor had to get out of the streetcar and move him from the tracks. As soon as the conductor got back into the streetcar, my brother got back into front of the streetcar. After a while, the conductor asked my brother where he lived but he would not tell. The conductor then took my brother from house to house until he found where my brother’s mother/grandparent lived. "You gotta keep this kid locked up, lady!" the conductor told my Mom.

    The great fun for me was to ride the streetcar by myself. I got on and rode to the end of the line in one direction, which was somewhere in the downtown area of Dallas, then came back, continuing until I reached the other end of the line, and finally getting back to where I originally got on the streetcar. That was a good entertainment deal for two hours at the cost of a nickel.

    Riding the train Copper Canyon through the Mexican mountains was much more than a train ride; it was the adventure of a lifetime. My wife is the travel coordinator and she did a great job in selecting this vacation. We took this trip in the late Sixties when the train ran from Ojinoga, Mexico (across from Presidio, Texas) through Chihuahua, Mexico on to Los Moches, Mexico, on the Mexican west coast.

    Getting to Presidio was an adventure in itself. We drove to Big Bend National Park and camped out. This was the last time my wife camped out with me, as you will see later. The afternoon we got to Big Bend, we took a burro across the Rio Grande River to the Mexican side to drink a "sort of" ice-cold beer. The specific place we camped provided us with a spectacular sunrise. We watched the sun come while its shadow slide down a high cliff of one of the many canyon walls in Big Bend. After the grand showing nature put on for us, my wife asked where the restrooms were…"Behind the bolder" was not a satisfactory answer for her!

    When we got to Presidio, we parked our car at the bus station and then rode a bus for a short ride across the Rio Grande River to the Ojinoga train station. The train station was actually a siding with a dusty path to the where we boarded the train. The train consisted of what looked to me like a pair of streetcars coupled. The first car first class and had air conditioning and refreshments. The second car was second and third class although I did know the distinction between the classes. The second car was not air-conditioned and pigs, goats and chickens accompanied many of the passengers. We traveled along, crossing the desert to Chihuahua, Mexico, at about twenty or so miles per hour. From to time, I would see jack rabbits that seemed to hop along as fast if not faster than we. Margaritas and chips were a nice treat as we lumbered across the hot, dry desert.

    We arrived in Chihuahua late that day and after we checked into the hotel, we found a restaurant and had a fabulous Mexican Steak dinner. The next day we took a guided tour of the city that concluded with a tour of the home of Pancho Via’s widow’s home. Pancho Via was an infamous bandit that caused mischief along the border in the late 1800’s and earlier 1900’s. His widow, an old woman, had married Pancho Via as a very young woman not long before his assignation, "Connie and Clyde" style. The assignation car, perforated with bullet holes, was on display.

    The next morning we boarded a "real" train and began our journey through the Copper Canyon and across the mountains. All told, we crossed thirty six major bridges and went through eighty six tunnels. More than once, we could see a bridge or another tunnel as we came out of the previous tunnel. Since there were no safety restrictions, many people stepped out in the open area vestibule between the passenger cars to get a better view. Moreover, what magnificent views there were to see! I did this for about half an hour myself – what fun! When I went back to join my wife in our cabin, she exclaimed, "What has happened to you?" It turns out that the diesel exhaust had coated my clothing and my face with black suet. The mess was a small price to pay for such a great half hour of spectacular sight seeing.

    At a point during the day, the train stopped to allow another train to pass and to give the passenger a chance to look into the Copper Canyon. At the side of these track many street vendors sold food, and souvenirs. Within just a few feet of the tracks, we could look out over the canyon. It dropped straight down as far as we could see. A sign nearby made the claim that five Grand Canyons could fit into the Copper Canyon! Some travelers left the train here and rode burros down to the floor of the canyon and stayed overnight in a hotel. A few days later, they would ride the little burros back up to the top and catch the train again to continue their trip across Mexico. Had we known the side trip was available we would have taken this side trip ourselves.

    We arrived at Los Moches late that day. Los Moches is near the west coast of Mexico approximately across the tip of Baja California Sur. At the mouth of a bay near Los Moches is the village of Topolobampo, which is the site one of only a few tidal electric generating plants. As the tide rises, water flows through water turbines to generate electricity. At high tide (and low), water does not flow so the turbines stop. When the tide falls and the water flows out of the bay, the turbines begin generating electricity. This is my "techie" memory of the area; the real memory is of the fantastic Mexican steak we had for supper.

    The trip back was equally beautiful but excitement and anticipation was satisfied already. We had miscalculated the travel time required to get from Presidio back to Dallas so we missed a day of work for which we had not planned.

    My wife and I traveled to Europe thanks to American Airlines Advantage Program. Before going, we purchased a Eurorail Pass anticipating much of our movement about Europe to be by rail. We got our airline tickets and assorted vouchers a few days before departure. Much to our surprise, we found a voucher for a free rental car for four days. We quickly revised our plans for the first few days of our trip. We picked our car in Lyon, France and had a great time roaming around France Germany and Switzerland for a few days. The day after returning our car back in Lyon, we began our next phase by rail.

    On the first leg of our rail journey, we began our travel in the late afternoon and arrived in Venice, Italy with a brief stop in Milan, Italy. Prior to boarding, we went to a small grocery near the train station and got cheese, ham, wine (we watched the bottled filled from a vat) and a loaf of what we started calling "pit" bread. "Pit" bread is simply a long loaf of unsliced bread tucked under the arm of Frenchmen wearing sleeveless undershirts (ugh!).

    Shortly after we departed Lyon, the train began climbing into the mountains. What wonderful views we saw of the city, the outskirts of the city, the plains and finally the mountains as darkness closed around our train. As the city scenes slid from view and the pleasant countryside emerged, we had our supper of cheese, ham, wine and "pit" bread. It was so good…kind of like on a camping trip when everything tastes so good. By the time we finished and darkness was approaching, the wine and gentle rocking of the train had its effect on us and we slept until the late evening and were awakened when the train stopped briefly in Milan, Italy.

    The train departed Milan and sometime during the night, the train stopped for some reason and we did not get into Venice until around 2:00 am instead of 10:00 pm. The station was a mess since it was full of backpack travelers sleeping on the benches and floor.

    A day or so later we got on an evening train to go to Monaco. We had a cabin that would accommodate four compatible people. During the night after we had gone to sleep a young couple came in and occupied the bunk above us. In the morning, I woke up looking at four legs dangling off the upper bunk. They hopped down, put on their clothes and left. Welcome to European travel!

    We ran out of time to ride the TGV although we saw it many times here and there. Even though the opportunity did not materialize for a ride on the TGV, we were very happy with the trains in Europe. They were on time, fast and clean. I could do this again.

    Once again, thanks to American Airline Advantage Program my wife and I traveled. This time we flew to Reno, Nevada, rented a car and drove to the north end of Lake Tahoe. During our stay, we drove all over visiting points of interest here and there.

    Our motel cabin faced south looking out over the lake. The window making this beautiful view possible had an outdoor thermometer. One morning the temperature was 28 degrees! This was late July. We had expected cooler weather but not below freezing.

    We decided to take an overnight excursion to Sacramento on the westbound train that came through Truckee, California. We arrived at the station with an hour to spare. We purchased our tickets and waited. About the time the train was to depart, a uniformed official looking person came through the train station announcing that the train was delayed by several days, yes several days, because of flooding in the Mississippi River Valley. The uniformed official was the bus driver that would take us to Sacramento if we still wanted to go.

    The bus was really a tour bus and the driver described all about the settlers that came through this area on their way to California. This was Donner Pass and the driver pointed out the very area where the infamous settlers had been stranded. We also saw the many snow tunnels that at one time had been wood and were now concrete.

    That afternoon in Sacramento we toured the Capital grounds. We could have spent more time there but we moved on to the "Old Sacramento" area. Our timing was off and the train museum was closed so we enjoyed a leisurely sushi dinner instead.

    The next morning we boarded the train that would take us back to Truckee. It was late morning and we went straight to the dinning room for an early lunch as the train made its way out of Sacramento and up into the mountains. The train followed the American River for a while and then slowly climbed above the river bottom. At one point, the river was far below us and nothing but a tiny sliver of silver far below us. Later, we passed through Donner Pass again, going this time through the snow tunnels. We then began our descent to Truckee and our trip was sadly over.

    Years later, I learned of the many railfan opportunities in and around Truckee. My wife and I instead tasted wine at the Truckee Wine festival going on just a few steps from the train station.

    One fall a few years ago, just after I bought a new Explorer, my wife and I drove to Eureka Springs, Arkansas. The summer heat had broken but it had not cooled enough to need jackets or start the fall color change. We drove east to New Boston, Texas, then drove north through the woods and hills of Arkansas. Somewhere along the way, we veered east, away from Fort Smith and on to Eureka Springs so that we could stay in the beauty of the hills and woods.

    Among the many beautiful sites, among which were religious in nature, is a short tourist train that runs twice daily. The train begins in town at a turntable and follows a creek for a few miles to a wye. The train, consisting of a locomotive, tender and a couple of passenger cars, reverses its direction for the return trip.

    Before changing directions, the passengers get off and may walk around the park area of sit at some picnic benches in the shade of trees. An attraction for children is to play near one leg of the wye. The train pulls into the leg, stops and on queue, blows off steam. The children are drenched in the cool water vapor from the blow off. Wet kids smell a lot like wet dogs!

    After the empty train turns around, the passengers re-board for the trip back to town. I learned a train safety lesson this day. Several people were walking near the tracks. The brakeman asked the people to move away from the tracks even though they were not in danger of being hit by the train. The brakeman explained that if a person were to fall towards the track they might fall onto the tracks and the engineer might not see them and might not be able to stop in time either.

    Out drive back, taking the shorter, less scenic route through Oklahoma, was not good for my brand new Explorer. That poor car went from being a couple of weeks old in Arkansas and Texas to several years old after bouncing on the very rough and bumpy roads in Oklahoma.