The Road Trip East Continues; Visiting The Cumbres and Toltec Narrow Gauge Steam Railroad In Chama, New Mexico

 Cumbres and Toltec locomotive #487 at the old coaling tower. (click to enlarge)
Fujifilm X-T2, 16-55mm f/2.8 lens @ 16mm; 1/350th sec. @ f/11; ISO 200 (3 image HDR)

After leaving Farmington, New Mexico, we hurried east to reach Chama, New Mexico as early as we could.  Chama is the home of the Cumbres and Toltec Narrow Gauge Railroad, an operation I once before visited and photographed and knew I wanted to someday return.  

(click to enlarge)
Olympus E-M1 Mark II,
12-100mm f/4 PRO lens @ 80mm;
1/400th sec. @ f/8; ISO 200

For you railfans this railroad runs over the old Denver and Rio Grande Western tracks between Chama, New Mexico and Antonito, Colorado on 3 ft. rail.  For those of you who aren't familiar with the widths of railroad tracks, "standard gauge," which you see on U.S railroads today, is 4 ft. 8 inches (142cm) between the rails.  If have been reading my blog for any length of time know that I have an affinity for railroads, especially steam locomotives.  How could I pass up this opportunity to photograph a steam operation? No way!

There are two trains that leave daily from Chama.  One at 8:30 a.m. and one at 10:00 a.m.  We knew we were too far away (and too lazy to get up long before dawn) to arrive in time to see the early train, but we arrived about 9:15, well in time to photograph the later train.

(click to enlarge)
Olympus E-M1 Mark II,
12-100mm f/4 PRO lens @ 54mm;
1/400th sec. @ f/8; ISO 200

The railroad is very popular with all ages of people as on this morning the parking lot was full of automobiles and there was a large group of individuals waiting to board the train.  The tourist dollars are very important to Chama and they keep the railroad in operation.  

While waiting for the train to depart, I took the opportunity to make some images of the crew and their preparations of the train.  When the train departed, I had no intention of "chasing it," as it is called, but for my wife and I to go on our way.  At the last minute, I decided to catch it out of town and make a couple of images of it traversing the countryside—just because I couldn't resist!  Lol.  


These are a few of my images from that morning.  I'll be posting more after I return home.

(click to enlarge)
Fujifilm X-T2, 16-55mm f/2.8 lens @ 27mm; 1/500th sec. @ f/8; ISO 320

(click to enlarge)
Olympus E-M1 Mark II, 12-100mm f/4 PRO lens @ 70mm; 1/500th sec. @ f/8; ISO 200

Hope you enjoyed a subject that is a little different but reflects world history.  There are not many steam railroad operations running in the world today.  Most, run and maintained by volunteers, are tourist attractions such as this one.

From Chama, we drove to Taos, New Mexico and I'll have some very interesting images from two different locations there.

Join me over at Instagram @dennisamook or my website, www.dennismook.com. 

Thanks for looking. Enjoy! 

Dennis A. Mook 

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