But Brett? Where'll I go, what'll I do?

 If your not in a hurry, the Steam Railroading Institute, home of PM 1225 is a bit "off the beaten path" from I75. Depending on when your going I'm not sure how much is there to see, the schedule is limited. There is an excursion scheduled for March 15, you could probably at least catch the loco in action.

Steam Railroading Institute

Pere Marquette Excursion

Forum member RailfanRon is a member of the restoration crew, maybe you could contact him for more details.

You will like: Dixie Union Station, Mason, Ohio; just north of Cincy.

Won't key in the "Frankly, my dear..." but wasn't that Rhett?

We have an OGR Dealers section in our web site. HERE are 19 OGR Dealers in Florida. I'll have to give some thought to upgrading that page with map links.

To find dealers in your state, CLICK HERE, choose your state from the drop-down list and click the big gray button.

Rich, in the dealer list for North Carolina you need to remove Dry Bridge Station in Mt. Airy. Unfortunately, Mike retired about four years ago. He tried for two years to find someone to buy the store and keep it open, but had no luck. He closed down in early 2010. He was a great guy to buy from or just stop in to talk trains. Hated to see him close.

I see you are coming through Ohio,  Home of all Ohioans!  If you have not been, Warther's woodcarvings in Dover is a wonderful afternoon, I haven't ever heard anybody regret going there.  If you have been there you know how wonderful it is.  Mooney Warther was a knife smith, and in his spare time built models of steam locomotives (to a set scale) out of various types of wood.  I do not know if he ever went to school if he did it wasn't for long.

But, and this is a heavy but, if you are going to drop by, i would say do it on your way home.  Dover isn't overly near to I-75, and you will regret having "someplace to be" if you stop by southbound.

Cincinnati Union Station is right off I-75. There is a world class layout in there. Also the Chattanooga Choo Choo is only a few blocks off the interstate. Real and toy trains.

Pete

This question caused me to try and play a bit.

I started on Google maps and did a search for MI to FL via I-75.  That drew me the normal path that Google will.

I then right clicked on the map and slected "what's here?"  That opened the "search nearby" option in the left (where the directions previously were) and entered the word "train".  Note the route is still on the map, the directions are just no longer shown.

It seems (I just tried this so have not played enough to figure if there are flaws) to properly pop up new results as you move around the map along the original route and and zoom in and out.  While I started in MI, (so the left heading for the search results continually said "train near Michigan"), the highlighted relevant businesses changed as I moved around.

Totally random example, there is a place called "Tim's Trains and Hobbies" just south of Cincinnati very close to I-75.  I've never been to Cincinnati, nor do I know Tim, so this is not an endorsement, just demonstrating how the tool can work.

There is also a Cincinnati Dinner Train, and a place near Lexington, Kentucky close to the interstate called Blue Grass Model Railway Supply, and something called the Central Kentucky Miniature Railroad(25-30 miles south of Lexington).  I knew of none of these things before just trying this.

The method seems to have promise if you have some time to zoom around and play with different search text.

-Dave