RBM&N 425 Excursions

Fall excursions usually posted in summer, steam powered and diesel excursions usually listed seperately on fall foliage page.

Their website is www.readingnorthern.com.  You will find links to the Gorge Tour and Passenger Service.  They also have a two page advertisement on the first two pages in the new issue of Trains magazine as well as a multi-page story about them within the mag.  You should find what you need on the website. 

They have, in the past, run that engine on the hour long trips (typically diesel powered) out of Jim Thorpe on Holiday weekends. I asked how often they do that and the answer was "when Andy Muller wants to" so that trend of holiday weekends may or may not continue this year.

It was a very enjoyable trip, nice ride, nice train, great town. Jim Thorpe was a very nice little town.

I have taken a few trips on the Reading and Northern and it is a first class operation. The owner of the railroad, Andy Muller(SP?) loved his railroad, steam and railfans.. I have done the Budd Cars and 425 to Jim Thorpe twice. The last time was on the railfan special in a gondola behind 425. Videos of that trip are on You Tube.  On May 18 the Lehigh Lines is having a rare milage trip over the whole system on their Budd's..Yes, their trips always sell out way in advance. Check the website regularly.

Cincytrains posted:

I have taken a few trips on the Reading and Northern and it is a first class operation. The owner of the railroad, Andy Muller(SP?) loved his railroad, steam and railfans.. I have done the Budd Cars and 425 to Jim Thorpe twice. The last time was on the railfan special in a gondola behind 425. Videos of that trip are on You Tube.  On May 18 the Lehigh Lines is having a rare milage trip over the whole system on their Budd's..Yes, their trips always sell out way in advance. Check the website regularly.

Is the railfan special something that happens yearly?

Having chased and ridden multiple trips behind #425 since 2016, I would expect the steam dates with #425 to be released sometime in the next 1-2 months (that's based on history). If everything stays the same, which it typically does, #425 will pull the Mountain Top Rotary trip in July from Penobscot to Jim Thorpe, PA and return. A couple months later in September, #425 will pull excursions during Schuylkill Haven's Borough Days from Schuylkill Haven to Port Clinton, PA and return. The month following I would expect #425 to pull her annual Fall trips during the middle two weekends of October.

The Fall trips are the real show so if you want to get the most bang for your buck I'd be there for those. And yes as you mentioned they do sell out quickly so be sure to watch the RBMN's passenger website for ticket information. The Fall trips have two boarding/unboarding sites: Outer Station in Reading, PA or Port Clinton, PA. The train in the morning will begin the excursion at the Outer Station and stop in Port Clinton for about 10 minutes to pick up more passengers. During the afternoon and evening on the return trip they will stop at Port Clinton for those that boarded there and take everyone else back to the Outer Station. 

#425 is a great light pacific, but she makes you quickly forget that once you see her blast up Hometown Hill or out of Tamaqua Tunnel or even up through the Lehigh Gorge State Park at Glen Onoko. If you can make any of the trips you'll be in for a real treat and even more so if you can be trackside for some moment in time as she heads up grade. #425 is definitely the rockstar of steam in PA currently. 

Have fun! 

I also forgot to mention that this year #425 pulled Christmas specials from the Outer Station in Reading, PA to Port Clinton, PA so if those also stay on the schedule this year, which is fairly likely, then you'll have even more options!

Actually, 425 only operated 3 days on the Lehigh Gorge Scenic last year: 6/23-24 (see my posts; 6/1/18, and 6/27/18), and on 9/23/18, the Sunday after the 9/22/18 Mountain Top-Jim Thorpe run. The latter date was unadvertised.

425 operated from Port Clinton to Schuylkill Haven 10/6-7 for Boro days.
The Fall Foliage and Santa trains marked the other uses of 425 in 2018.

The attached from the winter 2019 newsletter gives the only clue to the progress of 2102.
A full-time steam mechanic has been added to the crew.
I am riding the Lehigh Valley NRHS BUDD RDC trip on 5/18/2019, this is planned to go from Port Clinton to as far as Mehoopany, PA.
Here are some pics from the 12/23/18 Santa trains, which ran from North Reading to Port Clinton.

Hey who's that guy in the blue jacket in the fireman's seat? 

Is that you waving to all your fans, Mike?

Yep, waving to all 2 of them including you! 

 Too bad I didn't get time to catch up with you Warren at the Outer Station that day. Hope you had fun! If by chance, is there anyway you can email me the RAW and/or JPEG files of those pictures with me in the cab? I'd like to use them for memory sake. My email should be in my profile. 

Mike, it was the highlight of my Christmas season!
I rode the first train, and "chased" the next 2.

I got you coming and going at Kernville, the pics will be on the way. There were also more than 2 people there, there was 10 people trying to occupy a phone booth -sized space.

Warren Jenkins

Borden Tunnel posted:

Mike, it was the highlight of my Christmas season!
I rode the first train, and "chased" the next 2.

I got you coming and going at Kernville, the pics will be on the way. There were also more than 2 people there, there was 10 people trying to occupy a phone booth -sized space.

Warren Jenkins

 

Thanks so much Warren, I really appreciate it. 

Yes, I seem to remember about 10 there too in all seriousness. Seemed a bit crowded, but otherwise a "light" day of chasing along the R&N. Didn't compare much to the foamer fiasco of a Fall trip! 

Hey Borden Tunnel, that will be a fun trip and I am really looking forward to it. I coming out from NY on Friday afternoon and staying the weekend in Reading, actually Wyomminsing(SP?) Maybe we can hook up in the morning of at Port Clinton. And yes they usually run some kind of railfan special every fall.

PennsyPride94 posted:

Hey who's that guy in the blue jacket in the fireman's seat? 

Interesting. I thought that #425 was hand fired. So,,,,,,,,,,why would the Fireman be just sitting there waving at folks, i.e. who is then doing the shoveling?

PennsyPride94 posted:

Having chased and ridden multiple trips behind #425 since 2016, I would expect the steam dates with #425 to be released sometime in the next 1-2 months (that's based on history). If everything stays the same, which it typically does, #425 will pull the Mountain Top Rotary trip in July from Penobscot to Jim Thorpe, PA and return. A couple months later in September, #425 will pull excursions during Schuylkill Haven's Borough Days from Schuylkill Haven to Port Clinton, PA and return. The month following I would expect #425 to pull her annual Fall trips during the middle two weekends of October.

The Fall trips are the real show so if you want to get the most bang for your buck I'd be there for those. And yes as you mentioned they do sell out quickly so be sure to watch the RBMN's passenger website for ticket information. The Fall trips have two boarding/unboarding sites: Outer Station in Reading, PA or Port Clinton, PA. The train in the morning will begin the excursion at the Outer Station and stop in Port Clinton for about 10 minutes to pick up more passengers. During the afternoon and evening on the return trip they will stop at Port Clinton for those that boarded there and take everyone else back to the Outer Station. 

#425 is a great light pacific, but she makes you quickly forget that once you see her blast up Hometown Hill or out of Tamaqua Tunnel or even up through the Lehigh Gorge State Park at Glen Onoko. If you can make any of the trips you'll be in for a real treat and even more so if you can be trackside for some moment in time as she heads up grade. #425 is definitely the rockstar of steam in PA currently. 

Have fun! 

Thanks for all the information. It is much appreciated!

Hot Water posted:

PennsyPride94 posted:

Hey who's that guy in the blue jacket in the fireman's seat? 

Interesting. I thought that #425 was hand fired. So,,,,,,,,,,why would the Fireman be just sitting there waving at folks, i.e. who is then doing the shoveling?

Jack, I was a paid cab rider for two trips and yes #425 is hand fired. The fireman was doing what he was supposed to do while I was riding along: firing. 

The Reading and Northern is one of the best excursion railroads in the country. One of the few places you can ride long steam excursions since NS stopped doing them and Amtrak now banned most excursions including steam. The one 765 excursion I rode in fact ran on NS and RBMN tracks between Bethlehem and Pittston. The track south of Jim Thorpe is rare mileage, you can’t normally ride that unless you are an engineer for RBMN or NS, NS owns the ex-CNJ to Allentown south of Lehighton.

PennsyPride94 posted:

Hot Water posted:

PennsyPride94 posted:

Hey who's that guy in the blue jacket in the fireman's seat? 

Interesting. I thought that #425 was hand fired. So,,,,,,,,,,why would the Fireman be just sitting there waving at folks, i.e. who is then doing the shoveling?

Jack, I was a paid cab rider for two trips and yes #425 is hand fired. The fireman was doing what he was supposed to do while I was riding along: firing. 

Are cab rides something that are offered publicly or does one have to "know someone" at the railroad?

J 611 posted:

PennsyPride94 posted:

Hot Water posted:

PennsyPride94 posted:

Hey who's that guy in the blue jacket in the fireman's seat? 

Interesting. I thought that #425 was hand fired. So,,,,,,,,,,why would the Fireman be just sitting there waving at folks, i.e. who is then doing the shoveling?

Jack, I was a paid cab rider for two trips and yes #425 is hand fired. The fireman was doing what he was supposed to do while I was riding along: firing. 

Are cab rides something that are offered publicly or does one have to "know someone" at the railroad?

They are offered to anyone, price varies though depending on the trip. 

We did fall foliage trip last year. The ride would have been really great but with one exception. It was the Sunday trip and nobody serviced the train after the trip the day before. The toilets absolutely wreaked to the point that most of the cars had to have the toilets removed from service. After many years of having to take a stand on unfit toilets working on Conrail then NS the last thing I wanted was to smell the stinking toilet on our ride to Jim Thorpe. 

The red coaches date back to 1917 and the bathrooms are quite small. How are the bathrooms in the RDC’s? Do the blue coaches (ex-Reading Blueliners) have bathrooms? On May 18 there is an RDC railfan excursion from Port Clinton to somewhere on the ex-Lehigh Valley line possibly past Coxton Yard maybe Vosburg Tunnel if there is time. If they do Vosburg then it will be 4 tunnels on the trip. Tamaqua, Rockport, White Haven are the others. This will be over 200 miles round trip. Tickets are $119 and are sold by a railroad historical chapter in my area of Allentown, PA not the RBMN.

Ended up in the vestibule of the car behind 425 on one of CNJ 113's early trips, before they figured out how to fire 113.  425 had the best and loudest stack talk of just about anything I've ridden behind or seen.  Very impressive.

Bob

I don’t think they have run the Pittston to Jim Thorpe steam excursion in a few years and they only ran Tunkhannock to JT a few times. 425 usually runs the Reading to JT excursions in the fall, and maybe Mountain Top (Penobscot) to JT with the rotary club in July or September.

Robert K posted:

I don’t think they have run the Pittston to Jim Thorpe steam excursion in a few years and they only ran Tunkhannock to JT a few times. 425 usually runs the Reading to JT excursions in the fall, and maybe Mountain Top (Penobscot) to JT with the rotary club in July or September.

Are those tickets sold by the Rotaty? If so, do they have a website? Thanks. 

J 611 posted:

Robert K posted:

I don’t think they have run the Pittston to Jim Thorpe steam excursion in a few years and they only ran Tunkhannock to JT a few times. 425 usually runs the Reading to JT excursions in the fall, and maybe Mountain Top (Penobscot) to JT with the rotary club in July or September.

Are those tickets sold by the Rotaty? If so, do they have a website? Thanks. 

Yes, here is a link.