What is This? #11

WOW – how time goes by.

It’s nearly the end of the month without a single What is This?  Until now, that is. Here’s the first – and maybe only – What is This? for May 2011.

Do you know what this is part of ?

Hints: It looks the same horizontally and vertically. This is only part of the entire object, which is very popular. We have a couple of these here at the Frog & PenguINN . But, to tell you more (like where they are located) might make this far too easy.

As always, NO prizes, just braggin’ rights cause it’s just for fun!

The answer in tomorrow's post. Everyone is eligible to post a best guess – no exclusions.

Still no answer!!!!!

Well, there still is no answer to the burning question of what is the distance between the rails of a standard American Railroad track?

So here is a visual hint. This is a shot from the GSMRR Maintenance Yard of a set of train wheels and section of track minus the car. Not your usual site, but good for illustration.

SOOOOO What is the distance between rails and what is the measurment based on???? AND remember 'smart possums' should not give away the answer :-)

Grenville (heading back out the the fields)

Natural Highs . . .and NOT

Home Again on the VA eastern shore after a  week-long road trip to NC to celebrate the 14th anniversary of our 1st date by riding a train, touring a national park, and hiking to an observation tower. Boy, do we know how to relax (?).  We had a GREAT time. Grenville had his first-ever train ride in the engine cab. Needless to say he was excited – didn’t it show in his recent post and videos.

Our actual wedding anniversary (#12) is in August. We already have something special planned – of course, we’ll be posting about that too and sharing with everyone !

Cloudscapes viewed on the drive from Bryson City to Durham, NC.

The clouds looked ominous, but the weather was not and there were only a few raindrops. We had a few rainstorms during the trip, but nothing compared to the week-long soakings all along the U.S. east coast. The flower and veggie gardens here at home needed lots of watering on our return yesterday.

Clouds are fascinating to watch, especially when Grenville is driving and l’m in the passenger seat. This group looked like a giant plane. What do you think?

Gas prices were up and down from NC to the VA eastern shore – LOW of $3.69 to HIGH of $3.99/gal and everywhere in between. The average at home now seems to be $3.75/gal – down 14 cents from $3.89 when we left over a week ago.

Unlike clouds, none of these are natural.Could this be a sign (sorry, couldn’t resist) of lower prices to come – or a temporary drop before a summer season rise?. The next few months will let us all know.

ANY gas price drops in your part of the country/world?

Finally—The Video

Before i start i want to thank everyone who offered advice on how to get a video into a blog. This is by far one of the most time consuming endeavors.

So what will we see????? These video’s were shot from the cab of GSMRR Locomotive 711 on May 18, 2011. The trip was from Bryson City to the Nantahala Outdoor Center and back. The first video is going around Horseshoe Curve# 2. Yes there is another one but we did not go around it. Notice that the sight distance in this video is quite short. Most of the time it is less than 200 ft. I asked Engineer Dale if he made an emergency stop at this speed (15 mph) what would the distance be to come to a full stop? He estimated it to be 300 –400 ft. since we were hauling 10 passenger cars, over 200 people, with a weight of over 100 tons total. In short if we saw something on the track there is no way we could stop before we hit it. Also when the leaves are off the trees, you can see the last car entering the curve as the engine exits. Horseshoe Curve #2

Next we cross the Tuckasegee River Trestle. Watch how close we are to the trestle. Most people don’t realize that a train extends almost 3 feet beyond the rails on both sides. If you are on a trestle with no guard rails there will not be enough room for you and the train. Guess who will win????  Tuckasegee River Trestle.

So there they are. Question for today is:

What is the distance between the rails of a standard American railroad track and why this distance???

Possums are ineligible for this question because they are so smart :-)…

Say Good Night Grenville….”Good Night Grenville.”

GSMNP Mountain Farm Museum

The Mountain Farm Museum is a collection of 10 historic log buildings located at the Oconaluftee Visitor Center at the entrance to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park (GSMNP) on U.S. Hwy 441 near Cherokee, NC. The park assembled buildings from throughout the Great Smoky Mountains to create the farmstead which has a house, barn, apple house, spring house, chicken house, corn crib, blacksmith shop, and meat house. Other buildings include a hog pen, sorghum press, ash hopper, woodshed, and out house.The museum is based on a typical 1880s mountain farm in pioneer Appalachia. It’s open year-round and admission is free. In season, park staff and volunteers demonstrate how families may have lived 100 years ago. Gardens are planted during the spring and summer, and barn fowl roam the premises.

Most of the structures were built in the late 19th century and moved to the park in the 1950s. Because most of them were not moved from their original locations intact, they are ineligible for inclusion in the National Register of Historic Places.

The John Davis Cabin was built in 1900 and originally located on Indian Creek several miles to the west above Bryson City. John Davis moved to the area in 1885 to free-range his livestock. The cabin was constructed with matched chestnut logs joined with dove-tail notches. The house is a rare chance to view a log house built from chestnut wood before the chestnut blight decimated the American Chestnut during the 1930s and early 1940s.

The Enloe Barn was built around 1880 by Joseph Enloe, grandson of Abraham Enloe who owned the land where the museum is now found. This large barn housed livestock in its lower stalls and grain and fodder in its lofts. The roof consists of over 16,000 hand-split shingles.This is the only structure that was originally located in Oconaluftee and moved only 200 yards from its native spot.

The Messer Apple House,was built by Will Messer of Cataloochee, a valley located in the park on the other side of Cataloochee Mountain to the east. At its original location, the apple house was partially underground to help insulate it from summer heat and winter cold.

The meat house (not shown) was moved from Cataloochee. To cure meat (usually pork) and give it flavor, a small fire was built just inside the meat house, exposing the meat to several hours of smoke.

The Baxter/Jenkins Chicken house was built by Willis Baxter in the late 19th century and originally located in Tennessee. Chicken houses were used to protect chickens from carnivorous animals.

The blacksmith shop was built around 1900.

The springhouse was used by farmers for refrigeration.

This is one of two corn cribs, built around 1900, that were moved from north of Bryson City. Corn crib roofs were raised to place the recently-cut corn crop inside protecting it until it was ready to be taken to the mill.

I’ll Post the Video’s ,,,I promise!!!!!

I have tried 3 times to post the video of my train ride but each time, after waiting for it to load for an hour or so, i only got an error message. and now even the error message won’t copy over!!!!! AAAAARRRRGGGGG!!!!!!!! as Charlie Brown would say.

SOOO we will be home tomorrow evening and i will be back to using y desktop ‘puter (the one that doesn’t fall asleep) and i will make a last attempt to upload these thrill and chill, edge of your seat videos. I promise!!!!!

Friday Funnies

These funnies were seen as we drive on Rte. 40 in NC last weekend.

Curious as to what was on the back of this car, we took a zoomed-in look . . .

This brings tailgating parties to a new level. Want one too?

Get it here (only $400).

This motorist drove prepared for any gas shortage along the way.

Fugitive Bus-Train Wreck

No, we did not see this accident on our NC road trip. But we did see these movie accident leftovers in Dillsboro, NC.This “crash” shows the remains of the prison transport bus and freight train crash from the 1993 film, The Fugitive, which starred Harrison Form and Tommy Lee Jones and was based on the 1963–1967 television series of the same name, starring David Janssen.

For those unfamiliar with the storyline, here’s a recap: Helen, the wife of Dr. Richard Kimble, a well-respected Chicago surgeon has been murdered in their home. Although Dr. Kimble maintains that a one-armed man was responsible, he is charged with the murder, tried, convicted, and sentenced to death. But, on the way to prison, the transport bus veers off the road, rolls down an embankment and is then hit by a freight train. Kimble escapes and the story continues with his pursuit of the killer and the police pursuit of him.The film was directed by Andrew Davis and was one of the few movies associated with a television series to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture. It lost out to the black and white film, Schindler’s List.

We never saw the film, but after hearing about the now-aging wreck, took a 15-minute road trip from Bryson City, NC to Dillsboro.While more than half of The Fugitive is set in rural Illinois, a large portion of the principal filming was shot in Jackson County, NC in the Great Smoky Mountains. The wreck scene involving the prison transport bus and freight train was filmed outside Dillsboro, NC along the Great Smoky Mountains Railroad (GSMRR) not far from the RR’s maintenance yard.

A real train was crashed for the film, but both locomotives were empty shells purchased by the movie company for scrap value. All units (including 777, which never appeared in the film) were painted in the Illinois Southern red-gray-yellow paint scheme. Director Davis had one chance to get it right. The wreck was real with the train pushed along by a GSMRR locomotive, GP7 777.

Everyone – the producer (Davis), engineers, stunt doubles, and the movie's insurance company – expected that the train would crash into the bus at 35 mph, instead it flew through the shot at 42 mph. It’s stayed in this same location for the past 18 years. Riders on the GSMRR excursion train can see the wreckage when leaving the Dillsboro depot. However, it’s more difficult to see it from the roadway above as the area is quite overgrown.The location is not promoted as a tourist attraction since it is located on GSMRR private property, which is not open to the public. Grenville had to sign a release waiver; we were allowed to drive to the wreckage with instructions not to touch or get too close to it.

If you want to see the 1993 film accident scene from the bus careening off the roadway to the freight train striking it, you can view a movie video.

And, as Grenville mentioned in an earlier post, another film shot on the GSMRR was the 1999 romantic comedy, Forces of Nature, starring Sandra Bullock and Ben Affleck.

During the course of their travelling together, things keep happening like being on the wrong car of a train. The GSMRR coach, Royal Palm, was used in the film with the fictional American Federal RR name and it remains in that car that we rode this week.

Riding the Great Smoky Mountains Railroad

Yesterday i took my cab ride on the GSMRR, and what a ride. This line runs on a branch of what was the Southern Railroad known as the Murphy Branch. It runs one hundred eleven miles from Ashville to Murphy NC. Today Norfolk Southern owns the line from Asheville to mile post forty seven. From mile post 47, just east of Dillsboro, to Milepost 98 in Andrews is owned by GSMRR. From Andrews to Murphy is owned by the State of North Carolina and is unused. The line is a series of sharp curves and steep grades to almost 5%, trestles over rivers and tunnels under mountains.

I rode from Mile 63 in Bryson City to mile post 86 in Nantahala. Thanks to Engineer Dale and Brakeman Duane i got to see how difficult it is to keep a locomotive running smoothly while going up and down hills, rounding sharp curves, and negotiating narrow trestles. tomorrow i will upload two videos i shot. First going round Horseshoe Curve #2. As you come out of this 12 degree curve i’m told when there are no leaves on the trees you can see the last car just entering the curve. The next is on the 426 foot trestle over the Tuckasegee River.

A number of films have been shot on the GSMRR including the Fugitive with Harrison Ford, and Forces of Nature which Beatrice will tell you about.

Recently the GSMRR has purchased a Swedish locomotive and 9 Swedish passenger cars from the Belfast & Moosehead Lake Railroad (remember them from last October) and plan to use them as the “Hogwarts Express”. When the folks at GSMRR told me of this they could not believe that Beatrice and I had seen this train on our trip last fall. We are all excited and are planning a return visit once it is running.

Bryson City, NC

Today, Grenville rode in the engine cab of The Great Smokey Mountains Railroad (GSMRR) and to say he was excited would be an understatement. You can be sure that he’ll post about his adventures in a separate blog. These images were taken early today after arrival at the depot. We were there very early – did I mention that Grenville was so VERY excited?We rode together yesterday, so I took today to explore downtown Bryson City, NC. This is a small town that depends heavily on tourism during the spring and summer months. The GSMRR is a major factor (perhaps only?) in attracting visitors here. Bryson City is centered around the junction of Everett and Main Streets. Main Street is part of U.S. Route 19, which connects Bryson City to Cherokee to the northeast and Murphy to the southwest. Bryson City is the county seat for Swain County. In 2009, the population was 1,353.

The town is surrounded on all sides by mountains: the Great Smoky Mountains to the north, the Cowee Mountains to the south, and the Plott Balsams to the east. The boundary of the Nantahala National Forest passes just south of the city, and the boundary of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park passes to the north. Native Americans have been living and hunting in this area for over 14,000 years. The village of Kituhwa, believed to be the oldest Cherokee village, was located along the Tuckasegee River upstream from Bryson City. It was burned by American soldiers in 1776. In 1818, Big Bear, a Cherokee chief, received a 640-acre reservation of land immediately west of the confluence of Deep Creek and the Tuckasegee River, including most of what is now Bryson City. Big Bear sold part of his reservation to Darling Belk in 1819; another part to John Love in 1824. Throughout the 1830s, Belk’s heirs and Love fought an extended legal battle over control of the Big Bear reservation, with Love prevailing in 1840. The following year, Love sold part of the land to James and Diana Shular, who sold off parts of their land to Colonel Thaddeus Bryson and merchant Alfred Cline. A small hamlet called Bear Springs developed in what was once Big Bear's reservation. Today, bear statues are popular throughout downtown Bryson City.Along with other artwork seen downtown.In 1871, Swain County was formed from parts of Jackson County and Macon County. The new commissioners met at Lucy Cline’s store in Bear Springs. Mrs.Cline (Alfred’s widow) agreed to sell some lots of her land to form a county seat, initially called Charleston. It was laid out in a T-shape formed by what’s now Main Street and Everett Street (named for the county's first sheriff, Epp Everett).

For years, Bryson City had only dirt streets, which were often muddy, and no sidewalks. The first sidewalks were built with the property owners sharing expense on a voluntary basis; some had sidewalks and some did not. There was no stock law then, so livestock ran loose. The early economy of Swain County was farming, trading, merchandising, and manufacturing. The Western North Carolina Railroad laid tracks through Bryson City in 1884. Previously, all travel was by stage, wagons, or horseback. In 1889, the city was renamed Bryson City to acknowledge services rendered by one of its founders, Capt. Thaddeus Bryson, and to distinguish it from Charleston, SC.Three different courthouses were built in Bryson City between 1873 and 1908. Court was held at the first courthouse until 1882. An 1879 fire created the need for a new courthouse. Construction began in 1881 and was completed in 1882. This courthouse also as completely gutted by fire on January 3, 1908. A third courthouse was completed on the public square in November 1908 and is still there, but no longer used for judicial proceedings.

The increasing popularity of the automobile led to a decline in railroad transportation, and Southern Railway (who had replaced the Western North Carolina Railroad) dropped passenger service in 1948. After Norfolk Southern ended freight traffic on the railroad in 1985, the state of North Carolina purchased the tracks. In 1988, the scenic Great Smoky Mountains Railroad was established with its depot and departure point in Bryson City.

We dined at several places in Bryson City including Anthony’s – recommended by fellow bloggers, Lois and Kjell, who visited in March (we also had a deluxe pizza). We can recommend the Everett Street Diner for breakfast.

This was a long post, but the only one on Bryson City itself. We’re touring part (very small part) of the Great Smokey Mountains National Park Thursday, before starting the return trip home on Friday.