2022 National Garden Railway Convention: Part 2

What I enjoy most about going through all the pictures I took at the convention is seeing details I hadn't noticed. Most railroads have so much detail that there isn't enough time for me to capture it all while I'm there, so I take lots of pictures.

Gruenenwalt Berg Bahn

I really like the Grunenwalt Berg Bahn because it felt so natural in the garden. A 300 foot loop slowly winds its way throughout the garden, passing through and under mature plantings, and passing villages and other buildings like you see in this picture. Nearly everything except the track is scratch built, with many houses of fired clay and others of wood with tin roofs.

A beautiful curved arched truss passes over a dry stream bed.

And I also really liked seeing cows grazing in a field of dwarf marigolds. I didn't notice the quilts hanging on the clothes line until I was reviewing pictures.

A beautiful trestle and bridge crossing the dry stream bed. I was paying a lot of attention to different trestle styles as I was touring as I need to figure out what I'm going to be building.

Saint Mary and All Angels Railway

The Saint Mary and All Angels Railway is tucked into a rather small garden and demonstrated how a railroad can fit into whatever space you have. A giant statue of Mary looks down on passing trains.

My favorite feature was this collection of adobe buildings on top of a red rock mountain and a warehouse in the canyon below. If you look carefully you can see three nuns at the door of the church singing over the canyon.

And in another part of the garden a stream tumbles by a depot and grain elevator.

DB Railroad of Germany

Next up was the DB Railroad of Germany, another great reminder that a garden is just as important as the railroad that passes through it. Many, many tons of rock were placed to create a mountainous landscape that rises toward the back. Here we see a line winding around a pond stocked with koi.

And here the train passes over cataracts of the stream feeding the pond.

Two railroad bridges and an auto bridge pass over a dry creek in another part of the layout.

Most of the village residents seem to be hanging out in a Biergarten.

In another part of the garden, what was a concrete patio has been converted into a multiple track yard with an oil refinery at one end.

Colorado & Sparktown Railroad

The Colorado & Sparktown Railroad was definitely a wow moment and I wasn't surprised to learn that it had been featured in Garden Railways Magazine. A very long but relatively narrow layout along a slope with over 1,300 feet of track, the multiple loops allow for running up to nine trains simultaneously.

Can you see the train? There are so many manicured plants that at times the railroad completely disappears in the garden.

A passenger train crosses a small stream crosses one of the 19 bridges on the layout. I really like the cow pasture and the near-vertical wall of rock in the background.

This is the main street in the city of Sparktown, circa mid-1950s.

Another view of Sparktown showing the building roofs. A truly amazing amount of detail in modeling.

Here a Galloping Goose passes by a church on the edge of town.

A gorgeous lumber yard just outside of town.

And a tool shop along the tracks.

There was so much to see along the Colorado & Sparktown and these photos capture just a small fraction of what is there. Every aspect of this railroad was picture perfect.

Gold Dust & Red Rocks Railroad

A stream wanders through the Gold Dust & Red Rocks Railroad requiring multiple bridge crossings, all of which were scratch built. Lots of mature plants as well as this railroad was started 24 years ago. 

A key feature is a 40-foot long curved trestle that is double tracked on one end. Here a train is starting across the trestle, and note the arch bridge in the background.

Another view of the trestle.

I was planning on using bricks as a foundation for my trestle, but then I saw these custom made poured foundations and I think I might give this a try.

I didn't realize there was a connection between balloons and railroads, but I saw them so frequently on Colorado layouts that I think I need one now.

2022 National Garden Railway Convention: Part 1

I just returned from the 2022 National Garden Railway Convention in Colorado. This year's convention was hosted by the Denver Garden Railway Society which originated the national convention back in 1985 and has now hosted the national convention nine times. But this was my first time so every railroad I was seeing was new to me.

While the convention does have a variety of activities, I think the best description is a four-day road trip around greater Denver to tour (mostly) suburban gardens. It's a progressive garden party requiring a few hundred miles of driving. Over four days I saw 33 garden railroads of the 50 or so that were scheduled for tours. And many of those provided inspiration and ideas for what I may do on my railroad in the future.

A key takeaway for me was that no matter how big or small, how new or mature a garden railroad is, every one will have features that will catch my attention. For example, one rather new and immature railroad we visited didn't have much to it yet, but I was impressed by the homemade throws for turnouts the owner had built. Making throw switches isn't anything I had planned on doing but seeing this novel approach inspires me and gives me the confidence to try.

In this post and the next few I'll share some photos of various highlights of railroads I visited that impressed me.

A beautiful curved stone arch bridge on Paulette and Bob's World (P&BW) Railroad. I think I may have mentioned in an earlier post that I was thinking about building a curved poured concrete arch bridge. But seeing this one clad in stone may change my mind. A lot more work but it would be worth it.

And any reader of this blog knows how much I like grain elevators. This beautiful one was also found along the P&BW RR.

This and the next three pictures are from the Driftwood Garden Railroad. What impressed me most is that most of the buildings were scratch built using scraps of cedar fence boards, the same thing I'm using to build my trestles. I realized that once I'm done building trestles I will need to keep on building more things using all the wood scraps I have. Here we see a lumber mill.

And here is a beautiful example of a coal tipple with a trestle running to it so trains can deliver coal.

Another thing I loved about this railroad was the use of flags everywhere. Every building had one or more flags flying.

Along one stretch of track was a line of aged, crumbling buildings which reminded me of a ghost town as the cedar is now weathered. Simple to execute, and an idea that I'll need to steal. Note that in front of the wood structure is a piece of old rack from the cog railway that goes to the top of Pike's Peak.  

The Colorado & Northwest Railroad, nicknamed the Switzerland Trail, was started over 20 years ago. A very impressive layout with incredible attention to detail. This is modeled after a real life railroad that ran from Boulder into the mountains. Many of the scratch built buildings are modeled after real ones, and the owners had photos on hand showing the original buildings. The garden is incredible and includes 268 different types of plants. And a pond! This is the kind of railroad that makes me jealous.

Here, for example, is the Gold Hill Store. This building is still extant.

An amazing model of a stamp mill. The owner has replaced the wooden roof with plexiglass so we can see all of the detail inside.

Next to the stamp mill is a beautiful coal tipple with a trestle approach.

I really liked this fishing dock next to the pond. 

And a very impressive model of the original C&NW Railroad Station in Boulder (also extant) that was modeled using small bricks. Amazing! 

This is the Red Rocks Route Railroad. The yard is relatively small and the railroad takes up the entire space, yet the layout of the railroad and the use of full size plants fully utilizes the space available and makes the area feel bigger than it is. To the side of the garden is a patch of turf which provides a perfect vantage for nearly the entire railroad. If someone had handed me a Mai Tai I could have sat here for hours and watched trains appear and disappear.

The owner used a variety of natural red stone and various manufactured products around the railroad. Mixing the disparate materials works as the red color ties everything together. The focus is really on the stone, and I didn't realize at first that there were hardly any scale plants in the layout, as the full size plants around the yard made it seem very lush and green. And speaking of green, it was great to see a full Burlington Northern consist.

An impressive feature was this pedestrian bridge over multiple tracks that provided access to the garden. I'm not sure how many hundred pounds that sandstone slab weighs but I'm sure it wasn't easy to get it in place. 

Just as impressive is this 10-foot double track steel truss bridge across a pond filled with koi near the center of the layout. And in addition to the crossbucks with flashers by the pond there were a few other pieces of 1:1 scale railroad equipment scattered around the garden.

The Denver & Rio Grande Foothills Branch was one of my favorite railroads to visit because of the amazing views in addition to some outstanding modeling. One long loop curves and twists along the side of a hillside, following the terrain and using bridges and trestles as needed to maintain a nearly level route. This is a section of a 25-foot trestle with an outstanding view of the front range mountains. 

One of the several scratch built models sits along a siding.

A mine shaft and tipple for loading trains along the main line.

 

Part of a 25-foot three span through truss bridge.

A Galloping Goose waits on a side track in front of a passenger station. With the amazing scenery in the background it is almost magical how natural and realistic the railroad looks.

Laying out track and assembling the first trestle bents

Work continues on the PE&A as the weather allows. It has been raining continuously today so I decided to work on trestle bents in the garage. The rain has truly been incredible for this time of year which is normally the dry season. As of this afternoon it has rained 2.86 inches at our house since the start of June, which is more rain that we typically would expect to see in all of June through September combined. Some small streams in the region are at near or above flood stage right now.

In between showers there have been some dry periods so I've still been able to get outside. Yesterday was dry enough I was able to get the lawn mowed and do some other yard work before spending a little time on the layout.

I've been laying out track and moving it around to see what looks good. I like the idea of a spur along the rock wall here.

This junction will allow trains to switch between the inner loop and the outer loop. 

The inner loop will be mostly elevated above the outer loop. Here I'm building an incline to enable trains to transition between the two loops. 

Today I started cutting up a bunch of lumber so I can make trestle bents. These 1/2" cedar boards are leftover from the fence I built last year. They are about 18 inches long which is perfect for shorter trestle bents. I have some additional boards I'll use to make bents 24 inches and taller.

Using my table saw I turned the 1/2" boards in to a pile of 1/2" square posts and another pile of 1/4" strips to connect them. I then used my chop saw to cut the 1/4" strips to standard lengths.

At my workbench I'm using the same assembly process I used before as well as the jig I created a couple years ago. With premeasured pieces on hand the assembly goes quickly.

The first finished trestle bent! I assembled about two dozen today.

Lewis' Flax is blooming in my native plants garden

And to the west of the railroad the bearded iris are finally opening. Normally these would be bloomed out by the second week of June but everything is so late this year due to the cool and wet weather.