Railroads and Bears!

Another very early morning start in time to reach Durango and catch the 9.30 a.m. historic narrow gauge Durango to Silverton Steam train.
Our seats were in the Silver Vista carriage, which has open sides and a reinforced glass roof, so fabulous views all the way.

Ellie, our attendant giving us a briefing as we leave Durango.

The train runs along the Animas river following the road part of the way and then takes you through otherwise inaccessible areas of the Rocky Mountains all the way to Silverton.

Hikers are dropped off and picked up at flag stops to connect with hiking trails that go high into the mountains.

In front and behind the train a small rail car travels checking that the cinders from the train don’t start any fires, if they do then the car driver puts out the fire, if it’s to big for them to deal with they call in the forest service fire fighters. The day before the train had started a couple of fires and the fire fighters were still there damping down as we passed.

On average the train travels at about 18 miles an hour although in places the ledge the train travels along is so narrow that the speed limit is only 5 miles an hour, and yes it is an awful long way down to the river.

Although the line wasn’t allowed to be closed because it was the only access to mines and homes in the area, what really saved it was Hollywood. This is the train that was used in countless movies, among them Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.

There are spectacular views of mountains and the river all the way.

As we got higher into the mountains and pulled into Silverton, there was still snow very high up on some of the mountains.

Silverton is an old western mining town that now caters to hikers and tourists and is full of restaurants and stores. We had lunch at Natalia’s the oldest bordello in town.

Downtown Silverton.

As we were travelling home, we saw a bear grubbing around in the rocks just outside of Silverton. A huge cinnamon coloured thing with massive paws, beautiful but I was so glad we were in the train and not on the mountainside with it. Unfortunately no photographs as we were so excited we just didn’t think to take any.

Even though it was a long day, we had a fabulous time.

Have fun, we are!