Travel Date: September 9, 2025
Edit: October 30, 2025: Add Al Dunton’s last name.
Crossing back and forth between Colorado and New Mexico, this was the farthest southern point on our tour. We arrived at our take off point in Antonito, Colorado in time to see our steam locomotive – Cumbres and Toltec 488 – fueled up and moving into position.
Here’s a short video to give you the itch you’ll you can only scratch by riding a steam locomotive train
Unlike our other train rides this would not be a loop or out and back. We took it deep into the Rio Grande del Norte National Monument and Carson National Forest where Victor and PJ would pick us up and take us to the town where we would catch or next (and final) train.
We would spend most of our time out on the open car, but to get started we had to sit inside a car so the conductor could get a headcount. This is our very knowledgeable Road Scholar tour director, Al Dunton.
Man this dude knows a lot about trains. When we told him we lived in Portland he immediately asked if we have ridden WES (Westside Express Service) commuter rail trains. Sadly we haven’t; we need to get on that.
Once on the road track Jim, Terri, Carla and I headed back to the nearest open car to get the best view and feel of the trip.
I once went to a photography seminar and the teacher said the most important thing for taking beautiful pictures is to stand in beautiful places. Done and done. Here are three picture from the first half of our trip. The beautiful sky was a big help.
After a while we pulled into the ghost town of Osier, Colorado where we had lunch. Two trains, going in opposite directions stopped at the same time. They fed us a delicious lunch and we got to wander the grounds before heading out. Here is an old water tower,.
Here is Osier station in the virtual rear view mirror.
Pulling around a corner we saw our sister train heading back to our starting point.
Yes, it was just as beautiful on the second half of our journey
One of the benefits of the open car is the ability to get this view.
Just after four in the afternoon we arrived at Chama, New Mexico where Victor and PJ were waiting with the bus.
Our next, and final, ride would be on the Durango and Silverton Narrow Gauge RR. More on that in the next post.
