Farewells and I’m on the road again

This morning I said good bye to Nathan and his Mom and Dad as I hit the road for Albuquerque where I need to be by Tuesday night. There I will pick up my classmate Ray Tetreault who is also finishing his Sabbatical before returning to the Diocese of Providence. After breakfast at a local eatery (there seem to be very many near Beth and Doug’s place), I loaded my car and we said farewells. It was tough to leave the little guy; when I see him later in the summer he’ll be twice as big as he is now. Today he is five weeks old. His parents hope he learns to sleep during the night really soon!


I headed out for my cross country adventure by driving to one of the seven wonders of the modern world – Techacapi Loop in California. This 19th century engineering wonder helps get trains over the mountains in western California. By looping the track around and around and over itself, the engineers were able to keep this gradient to 2.2% for a distance of 28 miles. The summit is 3983 ft! I hunted out the loop amid the back roads and after an hour of searching, found it. Pictures do not do it justice, but here’s a few.


Down the road a piece and around the bend is another amazing train sight. It called Cajon Pass and this line carries the east west traffic of the BNSF – that’s the Burlington Northern Santa Fe – down through the mountains to San Bernardino – the
summit is about 4000 feet. Again pictures cannot present the scope of this beautiful wiggling in and out of canyons and cuts, but here are a few shots to give you a taste of the sight.

Tomorrow it’s off to Albuquerque!