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 Archives: March 27, 2008 The snow has begun to melt here in North Conway and fortunately it is doing so in a gradual manner. With so much snow on the ground there is potential for flooding and washing out of the tracks. At this time on the Conway line there is about 18" of snow on the track that has been packed down into ice by the snowmobiles. As of this writing we are 3 weeks away from opening day on April 19. At this point we can only imagine what the ROW looks like up in Crawford Notch. Wish us luck as we open the line! Over at the Roundhouse the guys have just about completed the window work on Gertrude Emma. Three coats of top quality polyurethane have been applied to each window frame and the window sills have had two coats of green. Pete Davis came up from Nashua to work on applying gold accents that say "Parlor Car" and to prepare the dome over the observation platform for repainting. The car should be out of the shop shortly. In the locomotive department we have made an executive decision to sideline U23B #2820 for the time being. B23-7 (currently #23) will be moved into the shop for removal and installation of a rebuilt air compressor. We will borrow the starting batteries from #2820 for #23 and hopefully get the engine into service for the upcoming season. Plans are to leave the unit in its blue Conrail paint scheme for this season with some Conway Scenic lettering. If all goes well the unit will become #1943 at some point which was its original Conrail number. Work is progressing on coach #6749. We are removing every other window post in the coach in order to install larger windows. This means that new window sills and posts have to be formed from sheet metal and the making of these new parts will be in-process before too long. A tremendous number of man-hours will be required to get this coach ready for service. We hope to have it in service for peak demand time during our fall foliage runs in September and October. Over at the station we are working hard on lining up everything that is needed for the Day out with Thomas™ event that we are hosting in July. Work has been performed on the server that runs our website as well as on our ticketing software. Speaking of the website be sure to check it out when you get a chance and click on all the different options that are available (www.conwayscenic.com). There are many new photographs of the railroad as well as a lot of historical info. The photos of the Station and the yard in the deep snow may be of special interest to our friends in the warmer climates. The station floor has just received two coats of polyurethane and it really looks good. Plans are in the works for painting the exterior of the station this year. Until next time thank you to all for your interest in and support of The Conway Scenic Railroad. Paul Hallett
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