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Published: September 27th 2019
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A tourist map of Old Sacramento After an excellent night back in a bed, we have a day to explore a little bit of Sacramento. Because old town Sacramento is a short walk from the train station, we plan to check our bags for the day and check out "Old Sac" as the locals call it.
There is a railroad museum right there, and it seems fitting to visit that museum today.
And that's what we did. The navigator failed to confirm the route before we started walking, so we ended up walking all the way across the Sacramento River before realizing we missed a turn somewhere. So after spending a little while appreciating the park on the other side of the river, we found our way back to the right side of the river.
The railroad museum is right there. If I had not missed the turn earlier, it would have been the first thing we noticed as we entered Old Sac. But then, we'd also have missed the park, which really is nice.
Whatever we expected before we entered the Railroad Museum, it would have been much less than we actually saw. The museum is really an excellent experience. Its filled
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A docent who greeted at the entrance with real rail cars and locomotives, cleaned and polished for display. With each engine they have posters and plaques explaining unique features built in. In the process of following the story told by the equipment on display, we learn about the building of the transcontinental railroad as well as the evolution of rail travel and freight travel across the United States.
We started our tour with a good video about the transcontinental railroad, followed by a short guided tour narrated by a knowledgeable docent. He concluded his tour by showing one of the two golden spikes made just for the joining of the two lines into one transcontinental railroad.
They had the largest steam locomotive ever built. Not a replica, the real thing. And we could walk up and into the engineer's cabin. A docent was there to show us all the gauges and controls, as well as all the special features of his workspace. He did mention his surprise at how many people ask him where the steering wheel is. This locomotive served only 12 years before being pulled from service because of the much better efficiency of diesel-powered equipment.
They had a private rail car,
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One explanatory plaque and the elegance built into all its features was amazing. It was like a miniature mansion, complete with fine china, luxurious furniture and carpeting. It even had quarters for the chef and porter. All they needed to do was hire the rail line to take them wherever they wanted to go.
There was a Pullman, made for a Canadian rail line, which we could walk through. It is set up with sound and vibration systems to make our walk through seem almost like the real thing. And it was very much like our experience on the viewliner cars, if only a little louder than the real thing. This car also had a docent, who told us about the car's features and showed us how the seating areas were changed at night into sleeping areas. (It was apparently for people much shorter than I.)
We took a short break to get a bite to eat, then concluded our time at the museum with a tour of the toy and model railroad exhibits, which took up the third floor of the building, and which have quite a story of their own.
Everywhere in the museum, we met friendly docents
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Earl, our tour guide who invited questions and had answers to them all. They all liked Natalie because she's a question machine.
All told, the Museum was a really good way to wrap up our trip.
At he moment, we are comfortably seated in the elegant Sacramento station, awaiting our train to Seattle. It's running 45 minutes late, but still has 5 hours to travel before it gets here. There's no good reason to get too excited yet. It is a train, after all.
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