Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas to all railans and followers and a happy New Year. May you all keep your cameras in hand and your scanners near by.

I bought the brand new Greater Toronto Area route for Microsoft Train Simulator, so here are a few of my video which I've created with it so far.

North Bound

On Tuesday, after venturing into Saint John at 6am to go to Walmart, I decided to make a little trip up north, Chipman, to be more precise. I arrived at 8:30am. I drove around for a little bit, then decided to head over to Cantor (Hardwood Ridge). When I arrived, the east facing signals showed red over red. Based on the time, I knew that I had for sure missed 121, as that would have went by probably around 5:30am. I had also assumed that I missed 305. I decided to park in an empty parking lot, and wait for a few minutes.

At about 8:50am, I overheard talk on the scanner about Chipman maintenance crew wanting to get clearance on the line from Chipman to North Branch. During the discussion, it was mentioned that 305 was just about to depart Moncton. Hence, I actually did not miss 305. I ventured back into Chipman to drive around some more and check out some crossings outside the community. Afterwards, I drove back to Cantor. While waiting, a maintenance crew drove by, and continued west on the line towards Bantalor. About 15 minutes later, 305 was given clearance to exit Chipman, about 20 minutes after that, I heard the horn for a dirt road private crossing around the corner.

Here's CN 305 passing through at about 10:15am.



Afterwards, I ventured BACK to Chipman. I figured that I'd have time to kill if I wanted to catch 473. At about 10:50am, maintenance crew were talking to the RTC. They wanted to do some work between Cantor (54.5) and Chipman (45). The RTC blurted: "CN 308 should be there shortly...It's meeting 305 in Napadogan in about an hour, so you should have least 2 hours". I didn't really want to stay for 2 hours. I knew that it was about 30 minutes by rail from Napadogan to McGivney. Hence, I decided to depart Chipman, and head north towards Doaktown, then back south towards McGivney. This was about 40km shorter than driving down to Minto, then up.

It took about 45 minutes to get to McGivney. A quick glance at the west facing signals showed green over red, so indeed, 308 had not arrived yet. After sitting for about 35 minutes, CN 308 came barreling through at track speed at about 12:20pm.



I decided to give up on 473, as I had not heard anything about it on the scanner. I went home, pretty satisfied about the outcome of my trip.

A New Location - Intro

I went for a drive today, and made a new discovery, as well as caught a few trains. Full details to come later.

NBSR...Out.

Well, on Saturday, I had decided that I wanted to get a shot of NBSR's eastbound train coming in to Saint John. The last day video that I have of NBSR during the day was from August 5, so I figured I was due time to catch another one.

After talking to Steve Boyko, he found out that the eastbound wouldn't be leaving McAdam until around 4pm, which would put it in Saint John by 6ish...drats, another night shot!

After Steve had mentioned this to me, my scanner picked up 405's clearance to head to Moncton. I figured that I might as well try to salvage what I could from the day. I decided to set up my shot in Hampton, since I wanted to pick up the hotbox detector for the video. The only other hotbox on the Sussex Sub is in Petitcodiac, and I didn't feel like driving up there. I set up shop at the dead end of a road. On the other side of the road is the main route to enter Hampton.

About 25 minutes after I arrived, CN 405 came through, with the hotbox going off at the end of the video:



After that, I called it a day and went home. I'm hoping that I can catch another NBSR, at least before Christmas.

New Look, Yet Again

I decided to change the look of this, yet again. I just need to work out a few tweaks, so hopefully this will end up looking more "complete" then the last one.

Neat Video

Here's a neat video that I've found on Youtube recently.



It's the "Wizards In Winter" song, but done in Model Train form. Very impressive. Looks like alot of work went into it.

McGivney on Saturday

Steve Boyko and I were in McGivney for a few hours on Saturday before the Fredericton Model Train Show. Rather than posting about it, Steve has made a wonderful post about it, so I'll let him explain.

http://www.traingeek.ca/blog/2008/12/three-hours-at-mcgivney.html

Remember, check out my youtube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/saintjohnrailfan

I'm Impressed

Well, after browsing around Youtube earlier today, I made a nice discovery. There is now an option in videos to watch them in "HD", instead of "High Quality". Of course, videos which aren't in HD, but are still high quality will have the option to play in high quality. There were a few videos which I shot that utilized Youtube's new enhanced video player. I was glad to find out today that for those videos, the option to "Play in HD" became available, rather than just "High Quality".

They were having a problem with those videos before, but obviously, they must have fixed it.

Incase you haven't noticed as well, youtube now has the option to embed your videos at different dimensions, with the max being below:



I'm off to McGivney for the morning tomorrow, and then the Fredericton train show afterwards. If I'm lucky, I might be able to catch the eastbound NBSR train on my way back home as well.

Rail Weekend

I decided to venture out and do a little bit of railfanning this weekend, since I won't be able to do very much of it during the week for the next few weeks.

Saturday

Anyway, I ventured into Saint John on Saturday morning to see what was going on, rail wise. I met up with Dave for a few hours, and we chatted about odds and ends, mostly rail related things. While in the city, I snapped a few pictures.





As Dave and I chatted, I noticed the local getting ready to head over, so I decided to get my camera out and grab a video.

Afterwards, I noticed the CN crew getting into the shop to get ready for their 405 run. I didn't bother sticking around. At around 1:40pm, Dave and I went our seperate ways. I decided to head home to Rothesay. Knowing that I could hear the clearance call from my house, I had no worries about missing it.

At around 4:45pm, 3 hours later, the RTC finally gave their clearance for 405. Knowing that it was getting dark, I decided to venture over near the Rothesay train station to catch a shot of CN 405. The lighting was crap, but I can't control those things.

CN 405 passed with an IC2700, 5349 and 2567 with a rather large train, especially for a Saturday. Here's the video of the Local and CN 405 on my "Super Saturday".





Sunday

Sunday was a rather quiet day. I decided to stay at home and get stuff done around the house, while keeping the scanner close by. At about 2:50pm, CN 405 got their clearance from the RTC. I knew that I wanted to try and get the shot at someplace different. I decided to head over to the Hammonds River bridge, since it was actually still light outside.

I arrived at my location. It's a nice spot just off the Hampton road. You can walk right down near the water. About half an hour after I set up, CN 405 came through, with the same power as Saturday.



The weekend turned out rather well.

Nice Day For A Video

I had gotten off of work around 12:30pm, so I decided to venture down to the Island Yard to see what was going on. After about a 2 hour wait, the crew finally came in to get their engine ready. I managed to get a quick picture of CN IC2700 before it went out of view:



I had heard that they needed to head over for 46 potash, so I decided to head home for a quick lunch, since I hadn't eaten yet. Just as I finished up, I heard the clearnace for 405 to enter the mainline and depart. I guess they must have cancelled their potash order. Also, it's nice to know that my scanner can pick up the RTC calls from 20km away.

After hearing this, I decided that I wanted to head out to Hampton to get a shot. A few minutes after arriving, Kevin Gaudet showed up. We chatted for a few minutes, then 405 came around the corner.

Here's CN 405 with 2418, 2582, and an IC 2700 for power.



That was the end to my day.

New Look

I tweaked around with the look of the blog a bit. Enjoy.

A Few Pictures

Here are a few pictures that I took on Rememberance Day. Not much, but oh well.

Rainy Sunday in New Brunswick

Well, on Sunday, the weather called for heavy rain. Even with that, Dave (nbsrfan) and myself ventured up to McGivney. We left Saint John a little after 4am. We ended up at McGivney a little after 6am. When we arrived, we were greeted with a green over red signal facing east, so we knew that 121 was due to arrive. We sat in car in the downpour of rain. At around 7:20am, CN 121 came barreling around the corner. However, once they started up the grade at the crossing, they throttled down, and stopped right in front of the green signal (before the siding). After a 5 minute stop, they were finally on the road again. Unfortunately, I have no idea as to why they stopped. There was no mention on the scanner.

Here are a few pictures. Sorry, they didn't turn out the best.




Here's the video of CN 121 with 8849,5539,5265 and 8827 as the DPU, hauling a total of 160 cars.



After talking with a few of the maintenance crew that arrived, it was discovered that the next train would not be arriving for a little while. So, rather than sitting in the pouring rain, we decided to venture down to Moncton. One of the maitenance crew had looked at the computer, and there was no sign of 305 on the computer. However, about half way between Fredericton and Moncton, we picked up on the scanner that CN 305 had the clearance to leave Chipman. Damn. We also discovered later on that CN 473 left Moncton around 11:30am, and CN 308 was due through McGivney sometime between 1:30 and 2pm, so there could have been a meet at McGivney. Ah well.

Anyway, once we arrived to Moncton, we heard VIA 14 getting their clearance to pass Gort, so we booted it to Marsh Junction for a clip. Afterwards we decided to venture out to Memramcook to catch VIA 14 passing through on the way to Halifax.



We had heard on the scanner that CN 407 pulled over in the siding at Evans, to let VIA pass. To my understanding, Evans is between Dorchester and Sackville, NB. Hence, we knew that 407 was close by. About 40 minutes after VIA came by, CN 407 rolled by with 5621, 8817 hauling 28 cars. Apparently there is no pick up in Truro on Sundays, which is why the train was so small.



Afterwards, we headed back into Moncton. There was very little going on, and we discovered that CN 405 had not arrived from Saint John yet. We decided to venture back home, but keep our eye out for it. We picked up on the scanner that 405 was stopped at McCully's to drop off potash cars. We booted it down to McCully's. We decided to try a different location, rather than near the potash terminal. CN 405 passed by with 5277, 2416 and 2650.



Afterwards, we decided to call it a day and head home. It was unfortunate that we didn't see as much as we wanted to in McGivney. As well, it was nice that even though it was raining most of the day, the rain help up once the trains came by. Of course, up until that last video.

Definately not one of the better trips, but something is better than nothing.

-Matt

McGivney

Rain or shine, I'll be heading up to McGivney tomorrow morning with Dave(nbsrfan). So, I'll have a few more videos to post.

It's Definately Been Awhile

Howdy folks,

Well, what can I say, it's been a while since I last made a post here. I'm finding it hard to keep this up to date. It's tricky because most of railfanning that I do is around the Saint John area, so after a while, it becomes somewhat repetitive. Hence, it seems rather pointless to keep making a blog entry for each train that I see, since most of them will be similar.

After a crashed computer and a newly purchased one, I've been able to get into Microsoft Train Simulator. It's such a great game because there are so many different things which can be done, including engine and rolling stock add ons.

Here is a video which I recently shot using Fraps, a game recording software. This consist was created by myself. CN with 8828, 5520, 8000, 2552, 2500 & 5333 for power haul 162 intermodal cars North on the Bala Sub. The first set of containers on the load resemble alot of the intermodal containers which you would see in Canada & the Maritimes. It was a rolling stock download which I got from Train-Sim.com. As well, after searching desperately, I was finally able to find a horn to match the SD70M-2 8800's engines which CN has. Although it's just a game, it sounds like the real thing!




Here's another video which I shot on Rememberance Day, of CN 405 leaving Saint John. Power was 5277, 5338 and 5771.



That's about it for now. Lets hope that I can somewhat do a better job of keeping this up to date.

-Matt

Export Train in Moncton

On Tuesday, I made the trip up to Moncton to check out the Export train which was making a stop in Moncton before venturing to Halifax. While I was in Moncton, here are a few videos which I managed to get:

CN 534 entering the spur at Painsec Junction:


VIA 614 passing Painsec Junction on the way to Halifax:


CN 405 Entering Yard At Gort In Moncton:


Finally, CN 436, the Export Train, passing Marsh Junction on the way to Halifax:


That's pretty much the part day summed up. I don't really want to get into much detail, since nothing really exciting happened.

Enjoy.

A "Kind Of New" Video.

Just thought that I'd post a video of CN 120 which I caught up in McGivney on October 6, 2008. Here's the story behind it:

My girlfriend had to go to Fredericton for a couple of hours, so since I had some time to kill, I decided to make the 30 minute trip up to McGivney to see if I could catch anything.

I arrived at 7:30pm. The east facing signals showed red over red, so I decided to take a walk down the line to the west facing signals; green over red! I knew that something was going to be along the way shortly.

After waiting, and waiting, and waiting, until around 9pm, I was just about to leave when I heard the pounding of the engines about 15 miles up the track(at least). It got louder and louder until I finally heard the whistle for Parker Ridge, I knew that the train would be here in a matter of moments. My only question was, which train was it? My thoughts were either 120, or perhaps 474, or even a late 308.

Finally, at around 9:05pm, CN 120 flies by with 115 cars.



I'll try to get back up to date later on.

Been A While

It's been a while since I've last made a post around here. I've done a few railfanning adventures. I'll post my stories here later on.

-Matt

Halifax Trip - Part 1

Well, I was up nice and early on Saturday morning. I was ready to hit the road by 8am. My plan was to stop somewhere along the Springhill Sub line between Moncton and Amherst, so I could catch 407 on the way back to Moncton.

I first stopped at Memramcook. Not much going on there, so I headed towards Sackville via Dorchester, since I hadn't been that way before. Dorchester was a nice spot, as there was a few crossings.

At around noon, I headed in to Sackville, and parked myself at a dead road where the tide and the old bridge is located. It's a great spot to catch a train coming around the corner from Amherst and passing through the Trench. I waited, and waited, and waited. At 2:30pm, I decided just to head off to Halifax. Turns out that 407 did not leave Dartmouth until around 9:30am(about 3 hours late). This would have put it in Amherst sometime after 3pm. I wanted to get to Halifax, so 2:30pm was my limit.

Once arriving in Halifax(Bedford, to me more exact), I unpacked, and made my way to the Bedford Irving, where a few local railfans hang out to catch CN 121 depart from Rockingham yard. I decided to shoot CN 121 passing the Irving. The time was around 8:40pm. Although it was dark, I had to make the best of the situation. Here's the video:



Afterwards, myself and around 6 other railfans went out for coffee. It turned out to be a great first night. Although I only managed to get one video, my weekend was just beginning.

Part 2 later on!

-Matt

Matt's Halifax Excursion

Well, I decided to make a trip over to Halifax this past weekend to visit some relatives, and of course, do some railfanning.

I managed to get 9 videos(it should have been 10, but that's a story of another time). They are all uploaded to youtube, and you can check them out here in my created video playlist:

http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=7257EF4B68CFD685

If you want to go in order of days, start from the bottom and work up. The actual story lines behind the videos will make more sense if you work from the bottom up.

I'll probably post in greater detail the trip later on...not much time now.

-Matt

Saturday To Sussex

Well, on Saturday, I figured that I'd attempt to follow CN 405 from Saint John to Sussex and try to get a few videos along the way.

Well, first thing, CN 405 heads over to Courtnay Bay to collect potash cars for the trip to Moncton.



I decided to try to get 405 outside of Saint John. I knew that I wanted to catch it at Hampton, but I wanted to get it before there. Hence, I decided that I would get my next video from Park Drive, which is just outside of Saint John. A bonus with having this spot is that it was quick access to the highway to Hampton. Here's the video:



Once I got to the highway, I quickly made my way to Hampton for my next shot. About 5 minutes after I got to Hampton, CN 405 came around the corner. Here's 405 through Hampton, NB with 113 cars.



My next plan was to catch it just outside of Sussex. After I left Hampton, it didn't take long for me to get ahead of it again. Once I arrived in Sussex, It took 405 about 10 minutes to arrive. Here's the next video of 405 heading into Sussex, NB.



I was originally going to call it a day there, but once I found out that 405 would have to stop at McCully's in Penobsquis, I knew that I'd have time to get one more video. Alas, I headed over to the east side of Sussex, Penobsquis, to be more exact. Once CN dropped off the 23 potash cars at the head end of the train at McCully's, the rest of the train made it's way to Moncton, and of course, here it is:



After that, I decided to call it a day. I think it turned out to be a good day, and I'm happy that the rain held off.

Old Times

I was looking at my videos on Youtube this morning. More specific, I was looking at my first few videos which I uploaded to my Youtube account.

There's definately a clear difference between my first video and my most recent one. The difference is practically night and day.

Here's my first uploaded video, on January 23, 2008 - CN 405 going through Hampton, NB:



Boy oh Boy. I think I've matured as a railfanner.

-Matt

Quick Update

I've changed the layout of my blog, yet again. I think I'm happy with this look. Although, I might change the colors around a little bit.

I've also added stuff down along the side on the right. I've added a "Followers" section where people can add themselves so that they can follow my blog, I guess. It sounds pretty cool though.

It's been slack for the railfanning in me. I'm hoping to get out this weekend(rain or shine, umbrella included) to get some videos done.

-Matt

New Camera

Well, I changed my mind on that particular camera. Turns out that ZR900 wasn't computer ready, as I would have to spend extra $$ to make it that way. Hence, I went in a different direction:



It's a Kodak Easyshare Z1012 IS digital camera. It's 10MP, a 12x optical zoom, as well as HD Video. I only ended up paying around $200, which is pretty good. And I even took it on it's inaugural run today.

Here's my newest video with my new camera. Sorry about the rain. I hate the rain.



Enjoy.

-Matt

Wanting A New Camera...

This is the next camera which want to get once I save up enough money.




It's a Canon ZR900. It seems like a good camera, and it's in my price range. One of these days...

Matt's Manic McGivney Moncton Marathon

Dave(nbsrfan) and I decided that Sunday would be a great day to head up to McGivney to catch a few trains in action. It actually turned out to be a great day! We left Saint John at around 3am(just when people were getting home from the bars). We arrived in McGivney at around 5am. When we got there, the east facing signals were red over red. I decided to choose my spots for my videos, since it was still dark, and I had time to kill. At around 5:45am, the signal changed to green over red, which meant that a westbound train was on the track, and heading our way! We waited, which I didn't mind, because the longer we had to wait, the brighter it got outside. About an hour later, I could see the lights come around the corner, and at 6:45am, CN 121 blased westbound with 137 container cars, and a killer horn!



Our first train of the day, and it wasn't even 7am yet! We did not have to wait too much longer. At around 7:50am, I noticed that the signal changed to red over yellow. What this meant is that there was another westbound train on the track, and it would have to take the siding here in McGivney! I thought that was great, since it would be a 2 for 1 train meet! At around 8:40am, CN 305 with 8837 as the lead engine made it's way to McGivney at a snails pace, and entered the siding. I also caught my eyes on first live DPU, which was also great!



I had no idea which train was on the other side waiting to pass 305. I was amazed that it was CN 308, since 308 does not pass McGivney until well into the afternoon. Once the train went into the siding, CN 308 came blasting through with yet another great engine, 8846!



So, we had already caught 3 trains, and it wasn't even 9am yet. We decided that since there would only be one more train on that line that day(CN 473), it would be good to head into Moncton for the rest of the day, and that's what we did. We had gotten into Moncton around noon, so I knew that CN 407 and VIA 614 would be shortly along. Dave and I decided to head over to Painsec Junction, which is just on the east side of the city. We were there for roughly an hour. We caught a train making its way eastbound. Dave and I assumed that it was VIA. However the engine didn't look right. I realized that it was CN 534, doing a local run. Once 534 passed, I looked into the horizon and saw that CN 407 had taken the siding. My guess was that it was waiting for VIA to pass before heading into Moncton. Sure enough, I was right. VIA 614 came barrelling by, and shortly after, 407 took the mainline. I was excited...two train meets in one day! Here the video of the meetup of the 3 trains:



After this, we decided to venture into Moncton to the Gort Yard, since we had a few hours to kill. Once there, we saw some engines shunting cars around. Once we made our way to the Delong Drive overpass, we bumped into Wendell Lemon. He informed us that CN 536 was just shortly coming around the corner. It was returning from the Irving Plant up in Chipman, NB. Here's the video of the shunting and 536:



Wendell informed us that VIA 615 was just arriving into the station. CN 534(the one we caught earlier) was on it's way back, and waiting for VIA to leave the station before it came back to the yard. We went down to Marsh Junction. We were not there long. About 20 minutes later, VIA 615 came along, and 5 minutes later, CN 534 passed by:



We decided to stay in the city to wait for CN 408 to leave east for Halifax. I knew that it would be leaving at a decent time, since 308 and 405 were back so early. We decided to stick around Marsh Junction to catch 408. Finally, at around 8:30pm, CN 408 passed by hauling 79 cars, heading towards Halifax.



Well, the day was finally over! 16 hours later, and 11 trains later, we decided to head back to Saint John. Also, just as we were leaving Moncton, we heard on the scanner that CN 406 was also leaving for Saint John around the same time we were. However, since it was getting dark and we were getting tired, that was it for railfanning today! Definately worth the trip!

Matt's Moncton Trip - The Full Story

So, I decided to venture up to Moncton on Monday for another day railfanning trip. The day started really well. I managed to get to Moncton at 6:30am..nice and early. I decided to begin my day at Berry Mills, just west of Moncton. At around 7:40am, CN 305 rolled along with a large load:



Shortly there after, at around 9:05am, CN 473 came along hauling 26 cars(I think):



Now, this is where the day kind of got bad. At around 10:30am, I decided to venture over to Memramcook, to try to catch the VIA 614 and CN 407. I parked along the road, so I could see the Moncton facing signal, as I was expecting the VIA train to be rolling along first. Well, apparently it didn't. CN 407 decided to cross my path first. CN 407 was coming from Halifax heading towards Moncton. By the time I was able to get my camera out and ready, I missed quite a bit of the train:



So CN 407 passed at around noon. After that, I decided to venture down to Salisburn to try to catch CN 405 returning from Saint John. I had to wait until around 2:30ish, but then 405 made it's way through at around 2:40pm. The location is Delong Drive, on the other side of the yard. I think it's a great location, becausae you can get a great shot of the train for about 5 or 6 kilometers up the track. Here's the video:



Finally, I decided to make my way to Painsec Junction. I knew the VIA wouldn't be in that area until around 5pm, so I had a few hours to kill. Finally, at around 5pm, VIA 615 rolled by at full speed, it seemed:



Unfortunately, that was the end of my train catching for the day. I hung around Moncton until 9:30pm. Unfortunately, CN 408 was late leaving, so I didn't get to catch it. So I was disappointed that I missed half of 407 and all of 408. I guess seeing 5 trains is better than none at all....

-Matt

Moncton Monday

I made a day trip to Moncton to do some railfanning. I managed to catch 5 trains. I'll post the videos up later on today.

Everyday is Saturday Night, But I Can't Wait For Sunday Morning....

I was up early today in the attempts to get a video of 406 and 405.

I arrived at Park Drive around 6am. Dave(nbsrfan) had decided that he would like to join me in the catch of 406 & 405. I had mentioned to him about a few locations on Saturday, but I guess we had our signals crossed, as he arrived at 6am, but was sitting at the Rothesay Park road crossing a few km up the road. After no sign of him, I gave him a call around 7am, and we got everything straigned out, so Dave made his way up to Park Drive. About an hour and a half later, and figuring out locations which to shoot at, CN 406 rolled by at around 8:20am.

Of course, here's the video:



After this, Dave and I headed back into Saint John to see what was going on. We were not in the city very long, as CN was looking at making a quick turnaround, and a quick one they did. At around 10:30am, CN 405 made it's way past the Rothesay Station with 31 cars, and engine 5736 ridin' shotgun with 2642 right behind it.

The video:



Well, that was everything for today.

Long Train Runnin'

Here is a video of CN 405 which I shot yesterday afternoon out in Rothesay, near the old train station. I had to wait about an hour and a half for this one. I was in Saint John earlier in the morning, and I sort of knew the pace that CN was on.

Here it is, with 183 cars...second longest that I've seen on 405.



Enjoy!

Rail Videos.net

Well, I'm excited. I managed to get my first accepted video on Rail-Vidoes.net

You can check it out here:

http://www.rail-videos.net/video/view.php?id=3248

Now, I just need to work on Railpictures.net

Bad Luck

Later on this morning, I'm going to try to head into Saint John to catch CN leaving Saint John. I wanted to do it yesterday, but bad luck prevented me from doing so.

Well, yesterday at around 12:30pm, I was sitting watching TV, and talking a little bit on Facebook. At 1pm, I was going to head over to Rothesay station to wait for CN to leave. Well, just as I thought about doing that, I could hear 405 blowing for a crossing here in Rothesay. Well, that plan was out. My next idea was to try to catch 406 coming back at night, since I've never gotten a night video of CN. I know that from what I've heard, 406 does not usually roll by Rothesay until between midnight and 2am. As the night went on, I was getting tired, so I decided to scrap that idea. I was still awake at 11:30pm...and guess what I could hear in the clear of the night? Of course, 406 was blowing for a crossing here in Rothesay. Perhaps the holiday was the reason why both trains came around earlier than usual.

So, alas, to my discovery, not only was it a holiday, it was also a bad day for railfanning. Hopefully I"ll have better luck tomorrow.

Busy Sunday

On Sunday, I was awake at 5:30am and wanted to see if CN 406 was back in Saint John or not. Last weekend, Dave(nbsrfan) and I went out at 6:30am to catch 406, but the train was already back. That was the first time in 6 catches that 406 was back that early for a Sunday. So I drove into Saint John at 5:30am. 406 was not back, so I drove back out to the Rothesay Station and waited, with an extra large coffee in hand.

At around 7:40am, CN 406 rolled by with 109 cars:



I followed it back into Saint John. They were doing a quick turnaround, which was good. So, once CN 405 left Saint John, I went out to Hampton, and decided to catch it there.

At around 10:30am, CN 405 rolled by Hampton with 24 cars.



After that, I went home and tried to finish unpacking!

Manic Moncton Marathon

Well, on Wednesday, I decided to make a day trip up to Moncton to see if I could catch a few trains in the area. I borrowed Dave's(nbsrfan) scanner to help me out. I started my trip by Stopping at Berry Mills, just west of Moncton around 9am. I was hoping to get a glimpse of CN 305 heading west. It usually leaves around 10am. I got my camera out with my tripod to get set up. About 5 minutes after I got everything set up, I heard the rumbling of the engines coming down the tracks. It caught me off guard a little bit, but I was still able to get the video.



After CN rolled by, I stuck around Berry Mills until around noon. After this, I stopped to grab a coffee and made my way to Memramcook. I waited about 90 minutes, then CN 407 came rumbling by at around 1:50pm.



I decided to stick around Memramcook to catch the VIA heading by from Halifax. I parked and sat next to the signals near the tracks. At around 4pm, the east facing signals turned green, which meant that the VIA was due shortly. About 55 minutes later, VIA finally rolled by. Usually when it's a CN Train, the light is only green for 5 minutes before the train rolls by. Since I had to wait that extra 55 minutes, I think that I missed CN 308 coming back to Moncton. Here's the VIA video.



Once the VIA rolled by, I decided to head back to Berry Mills. There's was not much action around there, but I did catch the VIA making it's way north after stopping at Moncton. The time was around 5:50pm. Here's the video:



After a little bit of supper, at around 7:30pm, I went out to Painsec Junction and waited to catch CN 408 making it's way to Halifax. I had the scanner with me, but nothing was getting picked up. Around 8pm, I was getting tired, so I decided to head into Moncton to go to the Gort Yard. I tried to maintain visibility of the tracks, so I went to Salisbury Road. I turned down Edinburgh Drive to head to Gort. As I was going through the crossing, I noticed "green over red" facing west. Sure enough, I looked the other way, and saw the train coming up to the crossing. By the time I was able to pull into the closest lot, the signals started, so I guess It was decided that I had to shoot this video the old fashined way(tripodless). Here's the video of CN 408:



Well, after that video, it was time to head home. I was a little upset about the last video, but I'm glad that I still was able to get five videos. It's definately worth doing again sometime soon!

-Matt

Personal Player

Here's is my personal youtube player with my channel.

First Post

Well, here's my first post in my new railway blog. As time comes, I'm going to be adding videos, pictures, etc.

Stay tuned, it's going to get crazy in here!