October 5th - 7th  2021b Checking Track & Blowing Leaves

Tuesday  Oct 5:  I had no help so I did some things that no help was needed.  I hooked up the batteries to the chargers and drained #7 and put heat into the fire box to dry her out.  I took out  #3 to get some pics of the down trees and cleaned up the ROW where we didn’t throw the twigs very far.  I noticed that #7 left a lot of sand at High Point  (first two pics).  I even ran up the CBE branch and found nothing blocked!  After this, I took the blower to the roundhouse roof and gutter and cleaned them off/out.  Then I blew the leaves off the ROW from Shithouse Curve to Phelps so it would be easier to change out ties on Wednesday.  That ended my day. Wednesday  Oct. 06:  Today Tom Weaver came down to help me with ties.  We took the twenty or so ties on the flat and went up to the apex of Shithouse Curve (M.P. 0.7) where Doug and I left off the last time we had a tie day.  We got those twenty in and went to the tie pile and loaded about 57 or so on the flat and broke for lunch.  After lunch we put in about 40 ties which brought us down to about M.P. 0.9 or so  (third pic).  A very productive day for only two old folks! Thursday  Oct.07:  Today I was on my own again.  First up was blowing the leaves off the shop roof.  Bruce came out to watch incase I fell so he could get help  (fourth pic).  It went without an incident.  Next I took #3 up to M.P. 0.2 to get a picture that wasn’t as blurry.  Here is #3 under the tree and where the tree hung up  (last two pics). When I got back I took #25 and got the tie flat out of the car barn and loaded all the ties on it that are ready to install.  I have about 79 ready to go in if the weather cooperates at the end of the month.  It wasn’t being nice to me today as it started to rain!  I went in the roundhouse and took the handle off the plug we put in the smoke jack to block air flow and put it on a new plug as the old one was really rusted out.  The rain was over so I lowered the culvert at the front door so I could get some covering over it.  The top was exposed and was slippery when wet.  Next up was a tractor ride to get some pulverized asphalt to top it off.   I used the rest in the bucket for the tractor crossing by the car barn.  I took the long way back and did a tour of the property on the trail Jack made.  I had to remove a dead tree across my path and then decided to get my shears to prune back some brush that was poking me as I drove by.  To end the day I took the washers off all the screws we took out the other day so they could be reused.   -  -  Tom Click any picture to expand, then scroll thru the rest.   Note: some pictures submitted were slightly blurry.

go back to the Photo Update listing page