And on to Winterfest

This past weekend, we cleaned up the main hall from Rails and began to set up for Winterfest. This year, we are on a tight schedule because we only have three weekends between Rails to the Darkside and Winterfest. In order to create the room in the Main Hall for Winterfest, we had to move Connecticut Company 0309, Springfield Terminal 10, and the Ponemah Locomotive out under the train shed which required a few cars to be tarped. We moved the Tie Handler to the very end of track 3 where the rail ends at the missing switch. The Sweeper was moved all the way up to the Tie Handler and ISU 1 was moved right up to the Sweeper. At that point, there was just enough room for 10 to fit outside. It was almost as if the track was built just for those cars.

Once the Visitor Center had the cars removed, Connecticut Company 65 and Montreal 2056 were moved into position using a come-along to create tension with a few volunteers behind the car pushing it.

A bunch of volunteers (George Contrada, Galen Semprebon, Jim Miller, Larry Lunden, Ben Wallace, Al Goff, John Arel, Bill Yungk, and myself), helped unload the Winterfest Trailer. Unfortunately, some of the ornaments needed to be thrown out because there was a leak in the trailer.

On Sunday, we moved the Northern and the Cleveland car into position. The Northern was moved with a come-along anchored to the truck of 0309 with a group of volunteers pushing behind it. The Cleveland car was moved with the backhoe and chains through the end door of the Visitor Center. Now it is on to setting up the main hall.