I was able to see the UP 4014 Big Boy as it made its way from Jim Thorpe to King of Prussia, Pa today. I wasn’t sure if the combination of the crowds and the heat were going to be too much, but I’m glad I went to see it in action.
The nice part of the run from Jim Thorpe to Reading was that the Reading Blue Mountain & Northern Railroad was running an excursion on the line which proceeded the Big Boy by a few minutes in each location. They had two diesels pulling their excursion painted in their Semi Quincentennial paint schemes. This turned into a nice warning bell that the Big Boy was about to arrive.
Yes, the crowds were crazy, not your “normal” railfans either. These were regular people for the most part. They often got too close to the rails for a good image of the locomotive, but they wanted to be there and enjoy it just the same.
The other thing to deal with was the heat. There was a police officer near me while I was downtown. I overheard that a couple of people were having heat related issues just before the Big Boy arrived.
The UP 4014 in Tamaqua, PA pulled into the station and stopped for about fifteen minutes. I was able to move into the crowd to get a shot of it in front of the station.
I set up to and made the following image as it crossed West Broad Street in Tamaqua.
After a warm walk back to my car, I headed to my next location. I set up at Molino.
Between the two trains. I repositioned to the shade-side of the tracks to include the small station on the left.
Next. I headed to Leesport, Pa but I wasn’t able to park close enough to walk in the heat. SO I moved on to the next location. This viaduct is on the West side of Reading.
I was headed home at this point. I was happy with what I saw over the day. Then I was coming down 422 into Stowe and realized I was ahead of the train again. So I stopped and photographed it.
Throughout the day, two things amazed me. The crowds that were coming out at every location and the heat. I walked into each location with a bottle of water in hand and my cooler was a very welcome sight every time I returned to the car.
