History was made in the spring of 2023 as the Cass Scenic Railroad began their 60th year of operation with the long-awaited return of excursions along the Greenbrier River to Durbin. To celebrate, the annual Rail Heritage Weekend was held the first weekend of May, featuring a photo freight and the first passenger train to run from Durbin to Cass in almost 40 years. Saturday featured Shay 11 on the freight consist, with shay 5 pulling the coaches that will be used on the new "Greenbrier Express" service. Runbys were held at Wanless, Nida, Hosterman and Nottingham before a brief stop at the former Durbin Rocket station. Unfortunately the return to Cass was delayed several hours as one of the boxcar's axles jumped the rail at an awkward sport just north of Hosterman. Luckily, our resourceful crew managed to get back on track and we returned in time for a nice dinner at the new Shays restaurant. On Sunday, 11 took us up the hill to Whittaker station followed by 5 with a two-car empty log train. Beginning with side-by-side runbys at the Cass deport, the skies grew increasingly ominous as we made stops at Gum Curve, the upper switchback, and the S-curve, before finally bursting just as we got to our lunch stop at Whittaker. After a final wet runby, we headed back down the mountain to end the event. It was a great weekend of steam in the West Virginia mountains and I look forward to returning later this year to see shays once again rolling along the Greenbrier.
6 окт 2024
