Part Sixteen

“Busy, busy, busy”

So between shitty Wi-Fi and all of the miles done so far as of Wednesday.....HI, how are you? Sorry to be so behind. If I was working for a newspaper or magazine and being this late, I think the next line from me would be, “Do you want fries with that?” A couple of things got in the way for getting Saturday’s post to run on Sunday. Add to that taking a day off to visit a ham radio buddy of mine on Sunday and extremely shitty Wi-Fi in Durango which stopped everything. Anyway, we are back. So, here is Saturday’s part of the journey.

It began with a little uncertainty. As I made a turn out of my hotel’s parking lot, the dashboard tells me that I am low on coolant and should stop safely. No sooner the car straightened out, the warning went out. Made another turn and the light comes back on again.  So I go south on I-25 and make a stop in Carr, Colorado to refuel and make a call to Enterprise. Spoke to Kiki about my problems and she had me stop in the city of Fort Collins, a half hour’s drive away. I find their office and am told to go to Grease Monkey Car Services, about 2 miles away. They get the car, go thru all of the fluids and we are back in business. Due to all of the car troubles, I had to forgo my trip to find the eastern portal of Moffat Tunnel in Rollinsville, Colorado. Better luck next time out..

Next is a stop at the Colorado Model Railroad Museum in Greeley, Colorado. This is a one of a kind layout in a very simple steel building.

It took 5 and a half years for this layout to be built. It is a mountain style layout based on the railroads of the Rocky Mountains. 

And it is run on DCC. What this means is that the tracks are fed a constant supply of DC voltage. Inside each locomotive is a digital receiver which picks commands from a small transmitter that each engineer has in his hands. The commands cause the locomotives to move, turn on the headlights, sound the horn and you can hear the locomotives throttle up and down just like the real thing.
Plus, the engineers use small walkie-talkies to talk to a dispatcher who sets the signals and switches around the layout:

All in all, it is a beautiful layout to see if you are in the Denver area, an hour’s drive north. 

Oh, and I got some ideas for that railroad themed ham radio shack, ready for Halloween:

Check out the photos blog to really appreciate this museum.

I head to Denver and the western suburb of Lakewood, Colorado. Seems a model railroading store that I use to go to in downtown Denver has moved, sort of. What was known a Caboose Hobbies is now just simply known as CABOOSE. Seems the hobbies store went out of business and someone bought the entire inventory and set up a new store.  For any railroad modeler from Z to LGB scale, you will find just about anything you might need. Go to http://www.caboose.com for more information. 

The last part of my day was spent with an old family friend Cheryl Ierna who grew up in Wethersfield, Connecticut; lived in Boston for quite a while and moved out to Littleton, Colorado about 15 years ago. Her husband is Michael and they have an adapted daughter named Nadia whom Cheryl went to Russia to adopt when Nadia was 2 months now and she is now a young teenager and an excellent equestrian. A baked chicken dinner and homemade banana nut bread was on the menu. We called it a night at 930pm and it was time for a good night's sleep

Sunday we go and Praise the Lord and then visit an old ham radio friend and see how the Denver Broncos do. Time is flying by.

I am Philip J Zocco. On The Road. In Littleton, Colorado.