In July, during my summer vacation, I visited train Mountain...
The longest miniature railroad in the world...
With over 23 miles of mainline track on a huge 2,200 acre property.
Train Mountain sits at an elevation of about 4,300 feet in a forest in Southern Oregon.
Not too far away from Crater Lake National Park.
It is world-famous to people involved in the hobby of live steam trains.
Several times a year, they have a big train meet where people bring their model trains to Train Mountain.
And it's not uncommon to have hundreds of trains here all at the same time.
Every three years, they have the most gigantic train meet of all... called The Triennial.
And the most recent one was just a week or two before I visited.
They had over 900 model train enthusiasts registered and over 380 trains at The Triennial.
But on the day that I visited Train Mountain, things were quite a bit more quiet than that!
I met up with Tom Watson who was super-friendly and welcoming...
And he spent several hours showing us around train Mountain.
We started with a little tour of some of the property on a golf cart.
And it's too bad that a video doesn't capture the smells...
Because the air was so clean and the trees filled the air with a fantastic pine scent.
I was surprised to see that part of the Train Mountain property runs right alongside busy Highway 97...
One of the main north-south routes through Oregon.
I've driven right by here about ten different times over the years and I never knew it was here until now.
After our golf cart tour, Tom showed us the big metal fabrication shop where they do a lot of repair work on their trains.
There were a lot of great looking trains in there...
And every possible piece of equipment you'd need to build one or work on one.
And then we headed over to a little train storage shed where Tom stores his train.
And he had it set up with the seating cars in front of the locomotive...
So I could shoot some good video of the big layout at Train Mountain with an unobstructed view.
He took us for an amazing ride through the property...
A ride that lasted about two hours...
And we didn't even cover the entire main line of the layout, only a portion during that time.
Many of the locomotives that run at Train Mountain are live steam.
Many others are battery-powered... using equipment not unlike what's in a motorized wheelchair.
And many others, like Tom's, use a gasoline-powered motor not that different from what you'd find on a lawnmower.
And you can hear that lawnmower-like sound of Tom's locomotive in the background right now.
One of the most beautiful parts of Train Mountain is where the layout goes through a big grove of Aspen trees.
I can't tell you how much I enjoyed riding through this part of the forest...
Smelling all the great smells and just enjoying the great views.
Tom told me that it's even more beautiful around the beginning of October when the Aspen trees get their fall colors.
Things went smoothly during almost all of our two-hour ride, but...
Our train did actually derail at one point!
See that pine cone lying in that switch up ahead?
I think that's actually what did it.
It was really interesting to see the gadget that Tom used to get the wheels of the locomotive back to being properly aligned on the rails.
See that green piece of metal that Tom put on the tracks just in front of the train?
All he had to do was run the train through that... and it perfectly lined up all the wheels with the tracks.
And that got us back in business.
It was a lot of fun riding with Tom on his train at Train Mountain.
And if you're passing through the Klamath Falls area...
They welcome you to stop by, take a self-guided tour of some of the cool train equipment that they have...
And if they have some trains running that day, you'll quite possibly get to go along for a ride!
And if you have small kids with you, there is a little place right next door to Train Mountain...
That is better suited for train rides for children.
It's called the Klamath and Western Railroad.
And they offer train rides on about a mile and a half of track, but...
It's only open on Saturdays, and only during the summer.
(Sound of train horn)
One other really cool thing about Train Mountain...
Is that they've got a big G-scale garden railway layout...
On a four acre section of Train Mountain officially known as Midway Circle...
But everyone just calls it G-Ville.
Since I run G-scale model trains at my house I was really fascinated to get a look around G-Ville at Train Mountain.
It's a gigantic G scale layout in a beautiful setting among the trees.
The G-scale trains don't run on the layout very often...
So, there was no activity on it the day that we visited...
But at certain times of the year, G-scale people are encouraged to bring their trains here and run them on the layout.
And I'm seriously thinking about bringing some of mine up here sometime!
If you've enjoyed getting a look at Train Mountain...
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I'm Jim Zim. Thanks for watching!
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