VICTORIA DAY RAILFANNING

Ron Newby and I went to Morrisburg and Cardinal Ontario to visit a fellow model railroader.  Then we headed trackside to see what we could catch on the CN.  I wanted to test some manual settings on the camera so I set everything using ISO 400, F 5.6 and 500 shutter speed.  The sun was mostly behind us at 180 degrees, however some were on a 90 degree bounce angle and in some cases 40 degrees into the sun..  

 The first train of the day was an eastbound VIA heading for Montreal.

 Arriving at Cardinal, the CASCO GMD1 switcher had just been up at the siding interchange with CN and was heading back to the corn syrup plant. This was done in a rush jumpink out of the car.  I forced the shadow highlights so you could at least see the locomotive.

 Here the locomotive stopped on the main street in town.  The conductor got down from the locomotive

Now the conductor stopped the traffic to let the locomotive proceed. 

 Crossing the street the locomotive winds down between the houses and across the streets to the plant which is located on the Saint Lawrence Seaway.

 This shot was not to good but it does show the long hood.  Darn.  Right into the sun.

 Going back to the CN mainline we arrived to catch the local with a couple of GP38-2(W)s.

 The train moved slowly up to the siding and the conductor can be seem getting ready to step down.

 Leaving  a single car on the main the train dropped two corn syrup tank cars in the siding.

 I just love the wonky track work

 In the next hour we saw a westbound VIA heading for Toronto.

 Then an eastbound mixed freight.  The sun was moving around creating bad reflective light at this time of the day so we decided to leave

 However it was still good for this cover going away shot.

Looks like we had a visit from a vulcher.  Hmmmm  Maybe we should get on our way.  As in all situations we no sooner packed up and headed down the road another westbound VIA roared past.  Ah well.  Nothing like having a fun railroad day.