I don't post a lot, so two in one day is extremely rare. However, I got to tell this story. After spending the weekend in Syracuse NY at the fairgrounds Model Train show with the FCTT club, my wife, daughter, and I hopped in the car for the return trip home. A favorite stop for dinner is a small restaurant on Route 19 in Leroy NY called the D&R Depot. It's located on an old B&O line which I believe runs from Rochester NY and heads south to Pittsburgh PA. The tracks are literally eight feet from the entrance. Just as the waitress takes our dessert order, I here the sound of an approaching train. Thirty seconds later four B&P power units thunder by with a 50 or so car train. The place was shaking as the locomotive and cars filled the window we were looking out of! What could be better than to cap off a train show weekend with this? The waitress returns and I ask her, How often do trains come by? She replies, "It's unscheduled, but when they do, everyone in the restaurant gets a wooden nickel for a free dessert on their next visit." We're talking homemade pies here!
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Great story. I was actually railfanning B&P coal trains in Pittsburgh a few weeks ago. Was the train you saw coal or something else?
RaritanRiverRailroadFan4 posted:Great story. I was actually railfanning B&P coal trains in Pittsburgh a few weeks ago. Was the train you saw coal or something else?
Mixed freight. Lots of corn syrup tankers and grain cars.
Sure Jim. Sure, it happened. Where's the video? No pics? Hmmm........
I thought that you were going to say that some lading fell off one of the pie cars (if there can be giraffe cars and Coors steamers and trains, there can be pie cars).
Nice story. Sounds like a pretty cool place to eat.
Cool story Jim. I can vouch for the restaurant. Very good homemade faire. I will have to time my visits better. Before the B&O bought that line in the '30s it was the Buffalo, Rochester, and Pittsburgh. Many of their former stations are still standing today. The Rochester station is also now a restaurant.
Pete
Any train that brings "desert" would probably just be covered hoppers full of sand. Sounds pretty boring to me.
ecd15 posted:Any train that brings "desert" would probably just be covered hoppers full of sand.
Bob...you need one or these in closure of your comment...
...which reminds me of an old TV quiz show that featured the same spelling confusion. It was some 'pyramid' show (The $10,000 Pyramid, I believe.) where, in a limited amount of time, you had to guess several words in the pyramid from clues your partner called out. I can't remember whether the posted word was 'desert' or 'dessert', but the clue caller was making the same mistake. He was calling out all the correct and familiar types of one, while the audience was roaring in agony over his/her misinterpretation of the posted word spelling....exactly opposite. And after the time had elapsed...and the money shot gone!...and the show host pointed out the difference/error, the clue-giver had this dumbfounded look on his/her face. Hey, what's a few thousand dollars over a misinterpreted word? Eh, what?
I suppose, somewhere, there are desserts called Sahara and Gobi, and deserts called Peach Melba and Cherry Pie, but Wikipedia sure ain't any help!
Here in Davison, Michigan, we have a restaurant....Whitey's...that is famous for its fish dinners, et al. It's situated just a few more than 8 feet from the CN/GTW mainline twixt Sarnia, Ontario (Port Huron, MI) and Flint, MI. I believe the single-track mainline must have a green light speed limit of around 60 mph or so. The frequent east-west hustle on this busy line is a real show-stopper, often more than once in a meal! Can't say the 'deserts' () are worth writing home about, though.
KD
Reminds me of a bad verbal joke: why can't you go hungry in the desert?
Eat plenty of sand which is there.
Sound it out ... "sandwiches there!"
What are you guys trying to say with this desert stuff!!!
I have been frequenting this restaurant for over twenty years, as we are only 7 miles away. We get a postcard every year for a free birthday dinner and my wife always has a couple wooden nickels in her purse for the spur of the moment stop on the way home. Every Christmas they have a tree with a train circling around it.......upside down on the ceiling! As for the desserts, name another place where you can get homemade elderberry pie.
Farmer_Bill posted:Reminds me of a bad verbal joke:
Why can't you go hungry in the desert?
Eat plenty of sand which is there.
Ditto this...