Rocky Top - 1959

Bill and I went to 5 places on the Garden Railroad Train Tour that the train club in Portland sponsors every year. These are the G scale trains - G for Garden. The first one we wanted to see has limited and difficult parking and we just couldn't get in to see it, so we went off to see three more in another part of town.  Those three couldn't be more different from one another.  One is built on the side of a cliff!  We have no idea how this guy built his set up.  The second one was nice and this older gentleman paid to have his outdoor railroad all done by professionals.  Lots of tunnels and very nicely done.  The third one is this one.  This fella really went all out with the set up of the town.  It's always 1959 in Rocky Top.  There is a train that runs around the town, but the focus seems to be on everything else.  It's just really wonderful what this guy did.    The last one was back in Vancouver and this one was equally interesting and so much fun to see.  It was in manufactured home over 55 senior residents place....we didn't expect to see as big of a layout as he had.  It was full of fun things and really nice landscaping with unusual trees that took some work to them...almost bonsai type skills to keep the maples small.  Their village is called Mapleton. To give you an idea that this hobby is on the expensive side, the outdoor track sells for about $8 a foot.  

  I have a lot of photos to go through and get them up on Flickr but I don't have time today, and not tomorrow.  Father's Day and Bill's birthday...Sunday and Monday...so we are busy tomorrow.  Maybe on Monday I can get some of them up for you to see...I'll whittle the photos down.  Really I will.

A beautiful day and it's going to be a beautiful week with warmer and warmer temperatures leading us to a very HOT (100 F??? eek) and uncomfortable weekend.  Next Sunday is Bill's brother's 75th birthday gathering.  Should be fun.  And thankfully, they have an air conditioned house.  

Keep on chugging, Blip Buddies.