Photo Gallery #2

These images were taken between July 1999 and August 2002. As always, click on the thumbnail to see the larger picture, and use your browser's BACK button to return to this page.
 
A group of bankers from America were in Clare on a golfing holiday, and one of the more patriotic of them decided to charter a special train for the Fourth of July. The day started with an early round at Lahinch, follwed by several rounds at Kenny's Pub before departure. Here the train waits while the driver searches the pubs of Lahinch for the group.
The train arrived at Quilty well behind schedule. One of the Yanks hopped off to take this shot of the train pulling into the station. Upon seeing this photo, the engineering department launched an investigation to determine whether it was the train, the station building, or the photographer who was out of plumb!
The train makes its way back towards Lahinch at the end of an exhausting day.
CLIFDEN pauses at Rineen while the crew and photographer enjoy a lovely July afternoon.
The last train of the millenium on the Extension. All right, if you're a stickler for detail, it was the last train of 1999. The railway's historian suggested duplicating the photo of the first train ever to run on the Extension, which is shown here in the first photo gallery. Even the soft focus was faithfully recreated!
The Extension was closed to service on 1/1/2000. The equipment was determined to be Y2K compliant, but it was feared that the train crews might not be! 2 January saw two trains in operation at once: CATHARINE hauling an up passenger train and PERCY at the head of a mixed down train, with meets staged at Lahinch and Miltown Malbay. My children and I were so busy throwing points and controlling throttles that no images were taken. However, once CATHARINE had run out of steam, there was time to take this image ofPERCY at Rineen, with the Lahinch goods shed just visible in the distant background to the right of the train. Also note the seasonal changes in foliage, compared to the image above of CLIFDEN in July.
 
The track crews had been less than diligent in their duties when this image was taken in June 2001.  That's the now-defunct Quilty station in the distance.  It's plain to see that there was no overriding vision for this corner of the garden.
What was needed was more trackwork and a branch line around the side of the house!  Here, the wye points for the junction have been cut into the main line, but you can see that much work remained.  In the background is what I called my stone wall kit.
The wall is complete, the dirt back filled and roughly graded, the track is laid and ballasted enough to carry a train.  All that remains to be done is the platform, the signals, the crossing gates, the Kilrush-Kilkee road, and the model of Taylor's pub on the other side.
In the spirit of a scene that was played out many times on the prototype, the branch train from Kilrush, here pulled by L&LS #9, meets up at Moyasta with the Kilkee-Ennis train headed by Slieve Callan.  Many details remain to be filled in, but this image was the inspiration for a lot of work through the dark winter months.
"The Baron," the gorgeous Roundhouse Pooter, paid a visit in June.
The Extension's now-traditional July 4th Special was handled this year by "Clifden."  The thyme flourished that summer.
"Aberfoyle" arrived in the spring of 2001.  Here she's doing what she was built to do--handling a passenger train with grace and ease.  Seen here at Rineen, running bunker-first because she needed some breaking-in in reverse.
"Aberfoyle" on the main with the afternoon passenger train from Kilkee bound for Ennis, meeting at Moyasta with the railcar, working the local service from Kilrush to Kilkee.