While I think that looking at the old rail bed behind the 700 loop is cool, I have done it before, and it is not really all that interesting to me anymore.
But, to borrow BDRs terminology, I did find something new that I considered to be pretty friggin cool on this trip. And to reward those of you who are still loyally reading along, I am going to tell you exactly where you can go and see what I am showing you here for yourself.
Before we get to that, lets review some background material.
Most people know that there used to be a railroad in Fort Wilderness, but a lot of people, myself included, do not have a clear understanding of the trains actual course. You can see it in this old map:
So, you can see that the train ran behind the 700 loop, stopped at the Settlement Depot (which is now the golf cart parking area for the Settlement bus stop), and then headed back to the Outpost, by traveling across the entrance of the 400 and 500 loops, and then crossing the road and traveling through the area where the dog park is now. From there, the train followed along a canal for a while, and then cut back into the campground just outside the entrance to the 1500 loop. For a long time, I didnt realize that the train re-entered the campground area in front of the 1500 loop. I thought it continued along the canal, and then turned toward the outpost area after passing the 1600-1900 loops.
But, you can still see old tracks right outside of the 1500 loop entrance:
Here is an aerial shot of the 1500 loop taken by one of Disneys black helicopters. The road marked Cottontail Curl is the 1500 loop. As you can see, a canal runs behind the 1500 loop, and connects up to the Meadow recreation area. Going the other way, this canal travels out into a larger canal. Ill tell you what the stars are for as we go along in this post:
This photo was taken in the area of where you see the red star in the aerial photo:
The photo of the tracks at the 1500 loop entrance was taken in the approximate area of the yellow star on the aerial photo.
I always thought that this is where the train crossed the smaller canal, and then proceeded along the path you see in this photo, which runs behind the 1500, 1600 and 1800 loops:
Just to give you an idea of the space back here, this is a view looking back toward the 1500 loop from this spot marked by the red star:
This is what you see when you look across the small canal here. To me it always looked that this mouth of the canal once had a bridge going across it:
As I was looking across the canal at the wildflowers and other things growing over there, something caught my eye. I swore that I saw a railroad track. Not just railroad ties, but with the track too. I decided that I needed to go over there to investigate.
So, I walked on out of the 1500 loop, along the canal, walked across the bridge that carries the roadway across the canal, and started walking down the other side of the canal. To my surprise, there was a steep little hill just off the road. This must have been the support for the train trellis that crossed the canal here.
As soon as I climbed that little hill, I saw something that I never thought I would see at the Fort . . .
Rails!
Look!:
If you look at these photos, you can see that these rails were covered with plant life, but you can see that a lot of it is brown and dead. The freezes from this past winter killed this all back enough to allow a view of the rails:
If you want to find this yourself, it is pretty simple. These photos were all taken in the area of the white star that you see in the aerial photo. It is just off the main road. If you go, though, please do me a favor. Let's keep this as our little Disboards Fort Fiends secret. We don't need a bunch of knuckleheads traipsing around the Fort ruining it for the rest of us. So, please keep this all on the Down Low. I don't usually tell you exactly how to see some of the stuff I have found, but I want to share this, because it is pretty friggin' cool.
I dont know much about trains or railroads. In fact, I would have to say that I know nothing about them. But, I understand that one souvenir railroad enthusiasts look for is railroad spikes. So I looked for one.
This rail seems to have been held in place with a bolt, not a spike:
Here we see another bolt on the right. Is that a spike on the left?
These rails seem to be held apart by spacers. I think I remember reading something about these being used on the FWRR:
In these photos, you can see how fast the plant life closes in around the tracks. As the warm weather continues, it will be near impossible to get through here:
Here we see a piece of rail, but it is not connected to the tie. As I said, I know nothing about railroads, but I thought that there would be a spike holding the rail to every tie. Apparently that is not how it was done:
Here is another set of spacers:
Here you can see that weeds and stuff are already growing back:
I have no idea what this wire is for. Looks like how I would do it if I was running the railroad. And, that is not a good thing:
This is a shot of where the rail stops, as it heads along the tracks leading up to where the train trellis must have been. You can see how the rail continues back into the brush here:
So, TCD made a new discovery last week, and saw intact rails from the FWRR for the first time.
And now you have too.
Pretty friggin cool. No?
TCD
And remember, we are keeping this all on the D.L., got it?
But it served me well for a few years, and was a really good camera at the time. But I guarded it like a hawk as to not break my new gadget. So no hiking expeditions with it.
