Did you ever wonder what it would be like to "catch out" on a freight train. My advice is DON'T!     If you must, please use caution, choose your actions and traveling companions wisely. Or you could end up as ---------- * *There used to be a site called DEAD TRAIN BUMS, it has fallen by the tracks or maybe onto the tracks.

Spring 1993 : Snow still lays heavy on the Bear River Range Mountains to the east of Ogden. I arrived in Salt Lake City by Southwest Airlines. I rented a car from Enterprise and drove to Ogden to meet "BS Boy Scout." We had planned all of it over the phone. We were to meet in Ogden, return the rental car, and hop a freight in Salt Lake City for home. The following pages will share this with you. The pictures and stories on this page and those to follow I will tell the highlights and the story of this exciting ride illustrated with photos I took myself using a Canon FX1 SLR. Memories I will keep. My thanks to BS Boy Scout - where ever he is - for his kind and expert help in making a memorable experience. Many of the pictures I took while on this adventure were damaged or lost. Some may have been stolen by a jealous ex-girlfriend. I have attempted to recreate or restage them when ever possible, and used repaired originals whenever necessary.

 

We outfitted ourselves with everything we thought would be needed. Water jugs, cups, a mean looking knife and toilet paper and a bottle of something to drink,  it was a good "sipping whisky.". The photo of me holding my "mean looking knive" was taken  the morning we left Ogden / SLC. My pack was light, with only a sleeping bag and a few personal items. My camera I carried in a separate bag. I reliazed only after ward, way too late, that I should have taken more film. We took a room for one night from the Ogden Motel 6 - highly recommended to anyone with the funds. Since it would be a while before we could shower or clean up we availed ourselves of all the facilities provided, like a shower..  The next morning we took the rental car back to Salt Lake City and a rather surprised Enterprise Car Rental employee, a nice girl, whose name I forgot, drove us to the tracks and the place where we would go through the hole in the fence to begin our adventure.	In this Picture, BS Boy Scout points toward the Bear Mountains, providing a beautiful back-drop to the start of our story. Shortly, we would be driven to a hole in the fence along the railroad right of way in downtown SLC, by a very surprised Enterprise Rental Car employee, whose name time has erased.
We Catch Out-MAP There was, as is not unusual, a long wait for the first southbound train. This gave us time to pose for pictures One, me standing on the tracks. Two for BS Boy Scout to tag the over-crossing support (with chalk) using his BS Boy Scout handle. The train we boarded was a work train, not a straight-through express such as passed us twice along the route home. We brought a bottle of Seagram's for entertainment. Minor mishap - BS Boy Scout's Mag Light came off of his belt, leaving only its belt loop clip behind. He looked for it for a bit. But soon settled back into what would be our transportation for several hours.	This particular section of the train was all military stuff headed for Fort Tooele Here is a good shot of the engines at the front of the train from our viewpoint.
Shortly after these pictures were taken, this train started slowing down. When it stopped it backed up about a mile and stopped again. The engineers and what not got all the hobos off the train and let them move to other cars further up. All the military trucks and equipment was being decoupled and dropped off on the Army base. BS and I moved to a Canadian Grainer. I think it was hauling lecithin nodules. We found a semi-comfortable lay inside the area behind the 2' round hole at the brake end of the car. BS "always prepared", decided to make us some hot coffee. He took out a metal canteen, struck a "fusie" outside between the cars, and proceeded to heat some water. A couple of teaspoons of instant coffee later and we were drinking hot coffee. Inside the area was dark, and the batteries to my flash had run down, but here is a picture him and another one of me drinking our coffee. About a couple of hours later this train stopped again. Here we got off and stretched our legs and visited with some equestrians who happened by. I think they owned the ranch that bordered the tracks. Friendly folks, talkin' to us hobos like we were just anybody else. The air brakes made that sound again, so we climbed aboard and crawled into our spot until the next stop.	It is beautiful weather for this kind of travel. The "grainer" we were in was the one to my right in this pictue. This was one of what seemed like a dozen stops this train would make, before it got to Yermo, Ca.
Hours later we are tired of settin' semi-reclined on the 45 degree angle on the sides of that grainer, we decide to watch the outside from our "porch." The outside area of the car had enough room to sit 2 people comfortably. We had only been there for about half an hour when the train began stopping again. It pulled off onto a side track and a "Cadillac Ride"-a freight hauling containerized cargo passed us at a speed we had not yet achieved on this train. Instead of starting up again our train stayed in place. The engineers were decoupling the part of the train we were on. We had to move and fast. Up toward the front of the train. The engineer saw us, What would he do? We spoke politely to him. He told us "there's a number of other folks traveling like you are int the spare engine, and pointed to the last engine at the front. We went aboard it and found about 6 other tramps there. Not enough room to even lay down. BS and I got out, just before the train started moving and moved to the second spare engine. We were in there by ourselves for the rest of the trip. Approaching southern Nevada headed for Las Vegas that train must have been doing 100 mph.	I have searched every place I could think of for these pictures or their negatives, with no results. From this point on in the story I will use recreated pictures [re-creating these pictures was an adventure in itself which will documented later] as I have none of the originals left. Here is what Las Vegas looks like from the inside of an engine in 2001. Note we come up behind Circus Circus. In 1993 there were none of the small businesses adjacent to the tracks as you see now.
I knew I looked like the genuine Hobo. The "Bull" in the Yermo yard was a kid about 20 or so. I approached him and asked when the next freight headed for Colton would be pulling out, and on which track. He got flustered and told me he that I could not know because I was not allowed to ride. (If I had not run out of film I would have photographed him.) I told him I had a house and car waiting for me in Rialto. He just laughed and said " IF that is true what are you doing here?" If I had answered it would have been "Having the time of my life!" I wonder if he ever goes on-line.	To me this was just a kick. There are many to whom it is a regular way of life. Here is the Yermo Yard Sign, and in the background a barracks for the off duty engineers and conductors. In this picture we would be lying on the ground with our packs.
Well, I have to be honest at this point we became bored. It happened sometime after hanging around the abandoned houses at the edge of the Yermo yard for only a couple hours. We had visited the little cafeteria several times for food or drinks, or to use the phone. But, there was no sign of a south bound freight and only rumors that one would be leaving in the morning. We decided to take a Greyhound home. Getting to the Greyhound, which was in Barstow, was another story. We called the "Dial-A-Ride and were ignored 2 times, before finally on the third try when a new driver came on, we got our ride to the bus station. Map of the full route	Re-created.  This view is southbound on the tracks leaving Las Vegas about 4 blocks south of Circus-Circus.  I would like to be allowed aboard a UP freight just to recreate these pictures exactly as they appeared, but there's a fat chance of  that ever happening. This one would be me setting in the engineer's seat looking out the window.