Verde Canyon Railroad

On Monday February 17th thirty of us (15 couples) from the park sojourned over to Clarkdale, AZ to take a daytrip on the Verde Canyon Railroad. Most of us drove over on Sunday in seperate cars (trucks) and spent Sunday and Monday nights at the Quality Inn in Cottonwood. Clarkdale is located in the north central part of the state north of Phoenix near Sedona. Because of the ubiquitous mountain ranges here in Arizona we had to loop around to the south or north in order to get there from Lake Havasu. Even so we still had to traverse some 6 to 7 thousand foot snow covered passes. It was a delightful drive though and the roads were bare. Teddy and I chose to take the somewhat famous mountain road from Prescott Valley through Jerome to Cottonwood. It is about thirty miles of mountain road with numerous switchbacks with sheer cliffs on the outside lane.






There aren't many places to pull off for pictures but Teddy did manage to snap a few out the truck window.












Jerome is an historic mining town built on the side of a mountain with houses and shops perched precariously on the side hills.

Several of us went out to dinner at an Italian eatery on Sunday evening and then gathered at the depot in Clarkdale on Monday noon for our train excursion.
The train trip that day was the Valentine's weekend Chocolate Lovers’ Festival an event that they run each year and because we had thirty people in our party we were given our own private car.
Included in the fare was complimentary champaign, snacks, sandwiches, hors d'oeuvres and more chocolate than I've eaten in the last year. A continuously flowing fountain of chocolate w/various dippers, and several cakes, truffles and the like. If chocolate does indeed cause pimples there's sure to be an epidemic here at Havasu Falls (smile).













We had a hostess, (Sallie with an ie) assigned to our car who pointed out landmarks as we passed them,










...such as this photo of a cliff dweling that ancient natives used...












...and this picture of a landmark called "Turtle Rock"











Teddy leans out of the doorway window on the platform between cars taken from the doorway window in the next car.







This proved to be a good vantage point to take photos as well, such as this shot of the following cars taken on a curve.





Here we are entering a tunnel along the way.



















... "the light at the end of the tunnel"























Then when we arrived at the turnaround point they unhooked the engines and shuttled them on a second track to the other end of the train for the trip back





.







There was an open outdoor car that we could walk to which I took advantage of on the way back to snap this pict of the Verde River Canyon, sometimes known as Arizona's second "Grand Canyon"
What a fine time we had!!! Teddy says that she would like to do it again. Trouble is though there are still too many other things to see. (Grin)