Freight Train Leapfrog

It was a sunny, hazy and hot day last September. We were cruising east on highway 17 from Sault Ste. Marie, having returned thence the day before from a wonderful trip (which I must blog about some other time) to Hearst and back on the Algoma Central Railway, when we came up on this:
No, not the bearded hippy driving the car -- I mean that orange thing way out the window! That's a Huron Central freight train on the Webbwood sub, drawn by a trio of GP40-2's.

We were moving faster, so a few klicks later we turned left onto a dirt sideroad, about a kilometer down which we came to the track crossing. We didn't have long to wait for the train to reach our position, and grabbed a few shots as it went through:



As it happens, two of these engines are the same ones we caught in Sudbury yard a year before, a photo of which graced the OVAR front page for a while.

Returning to the highway, we soon overtake the train again:








Presently, we come to the town of Massey, where the tracks run just behind the main street buildings. Finding a suitable-looking parking lot, we stop and lie in wait.

And wait.

And wait. In the sun.

Looks like we got farther ahead than we thought.

Did I mention how hot it was that day?

Finally, the 300mm lens picks an approaching headlight out of the heat haze.


And the three big engines roar through town, adding their own increment (as you can see) to the dog-day atmosphere:




























As spontaneous, stop-along-the-road-because-you-see-something (and what the heck, you're on vacation after all) happenings go, this was a pretty good one ;-).