Friday 3rd July
We left Falconridge heading towards Vancouver at 8:15am, with the temperature about 12 deg C. Going through the city on Hwy #1 there were a couple of helicopters and jets from CAF, obviously practising for the Stampede opening later that day. The trip through to Lake Louise saw no trains, apart from one across the valley at the LaFarge cement plant at Exeshaw.
Just passed the Lake Louise turnoff I spotted a short freight (17 cars) moving west,less than a kilometre from the Kicking Horse Pass Summit (Continental Divide, highest point on CP and highest point on Trans Canada Highway) so we stopped at Wapta Lake and took photos and video as the train went around the far side of the lake, but passed it again before it got to the Spiral Tunnels. We did not stop at the Spiral Tunnel lookout as the trees are so prolific it is often hard to see the rail line. Just a few kilometres further on is the town of Field, basically a railroad town and a large westbound trains was waiting in the yard. We passed another westbound stack train, but did not see the headend as it was deep in the river valley.
Arriving in Golden we could see a couple of trains sitting in the yard across the other side of the town. Golden is the junction of CP’s Calgary mainline and the line that comes up the valley from Lethbridge, also known as the Crowsnest Pass line. Golden was our first petrol stop, also a Tim Hortons coffee stop. Between Golden and Revelstoke we passed over the famous Rogers Pass, but only saw a stationery coal train across the valley.
Shortly after leaving Golden we saw an eastbound grain (empties) rounding a point beside a lake at Three Valley.
I had already asked if we could make a stop at Craigellachie, the site of the Last Spike on the Canadian Pacific, and shortly after topping up the tank, Naushad wanted a lunch stop and pulled into a rest area, to find it was the Craigellachie memorial. I got out of the car and walked towards the monument to hear an approaching eastbound, so ran the remaining distance to photograph a stack train, and it was long! After a 30 minute stop (and a few purchases at the Last Spike Gift Shop) we resumed to see another eastbound grain (empties), and just behind that another eastbound stack train with a few auto racks at the rear, this time at Malakwa, just 5 or 6 km west of Craigellachie.
A few clicks further on at Shuswap Lake we encountered two trains, another eastbound (coal empties) and a westbound grain, moving slowly. Just behind the coal empties was another stack train (east bound) and this was recorded on video. Around the Salmon Arm area there are no good views of the rail line from the road, so the next train we saw was at Campbell Creek, about 15km short of Kamloops, and this was a coal empty with one head end loco, one mid train and one rear end helper.
The area around Kamloops is a lot drier and the temperature was now 33 C. Across the river and way below us we could see the CN yard. Another petrol, cold drink and coffee stop before we continued. The main road does not follow the rail line east of Kamloops, but shortly after leaving Kamloops I saw a couple of large eagles soaring over the road. Most likely Golden Eagles, or juvenile Bald eagles.
It is 341km from Kamloops to Vancouver and most is a series of up and downs, one downhill grade was 19km long!
We catch up with rail again at Hope on the banks of the Fraser River. This is CP/CN shared track here with westbounds on the south side and eastbounds on the north side of the river.
We arrived at Naushad’s sisters house at 8:15pm Calgary time (9:15pm BC time) so the trip of about 960km had taken nearly 13 hours with just a few short stops, mainly for petrol.
We left Falconridge heading towards Vancouver at 8:15am, with the temperature about 12 deg C. Going through the city on Hwy #1 there were a couple of helicopters and jets from CAF, obviously practising for the Stampede opening later that day. The trip through to Lake Louise saw no trains, apart from one across the valley at the LaFarge cement plant at Exeshaw.
Just passed the Lake Louise turnoff I spotted a short freight (17 cars) moving west,less than a kilometre from the Kicking Horse Pass Summit (Continental Divide, highest point on CP and highest point on Trans Canada Highway) so we stopped at Wapta Lake and took photos and video as the train went around the far side of the lake, but passed it again before it got to the Spiral Tunnels. We did not stop at the Spiral Tunnel lookout as the trees are so prolific it is often hard to see the rail line. Just a few kilometres further on is the town of Field, basically a railroad town and a large westbound trains was waiting in the yard. We passed another westbound stack train, but did not see the headend as it was deep in the river valley.
Arriving in Golden we could see a couple of trains sitting in the yard across the other side of the town. Golden is the junction of CP’s Calgary mainline and the line that comes up the valley from Lethbridge, also known as the Crowsnest Pass line. Golden was our first petrol stop, also a Tim Hortons coffee stop. Between Golden and Revelstoke we passed over the famous Rogers Pass, but only saw a stationery coal train across the valley.
Shortly after leaving Golden we saw an eastbound grain (empties) rounding a point beside a lake at Three Valley.
I had already asked if we could make a stop at Craigellachie, the site of the Last Spike on the Canadian Pacific, and shortly after topping up the tank, Naushad wanted a lunch stop and pulled into a rest area, to find it was the Craigellachie memorial. I got out of the car and walked towards the monument to hear an approaching eastbound, so ran the remaining distance to photograph a stack train, and it was long! After a 30 minute stop (and a few purchases at the Last Spike Gift Shop) we resumed to see another eastbound grain (empties), and just behind that another eastbound stack train with a few auto racks at the rear, this time at Malakwa, just 5 or 6 km west of Craigellachie.
A few clicks further on at Shuswap Lake we encountered two trains, another eastbound (coal empties) and a westbound grain, moving slowly. Just behind the coal empties was another stack train (east bound) and this was recorded on video. Around the Salmon Arm area there are no good views of the rail line from the road, so the next train we saw was at Campbell Creek, about 15km short of Kamloops, and this was a coal empty with one head end loco, one mid train and one rear end helper.
The area around Kamloops is a lot drier and the temperature was now 33 C. Across the river and way below us we could see the CN yard. Another petrol, cold drink and coffee stop before we continued. The main road does not follow the rail line east of Kamloops, but shortly after leaving Kamloops I saw a couple of large eagles soaring over the road. Most likely Golden Eagles, or juvenile Bald eagles.
It is 341km from Kamloops to Vancouver and most is a series of up and downs, one downhill grade was 19km long!
We catch up with rail again at Hope on the banks of the Fraser River. This is CP/CN shared track here with westbounds on the south side and eastbounds on the north side of the river.
We arrived at Naushad’s sisters house at 8:15pm Calgary time (9:15pm BC time) so the trip of about 960km had taken nearly 13 hours with just a few short stops, mainly for petrol.
