
The museum collection is housed in a fenced in area on the old yard tracks. They opened up the gates for us and we had a guided tour of the equipment on site. Lots of interesting pieces on display, some very unique. I particularly enjoyed the MEC caboose #681 that we were able to walk through.


A Conn DOT commuter train came around the reverse loop for a crew change so I was able to get some pictures and video of the clean locomotive in a New Haven inspired paint scheme.

Pretty neat also was a refurbished PRR RPO. The inside was restored giving us a look at how the mail was handled and sorted aboard the train.


After looking around inside the depot we were taken on a short ride through the yard on a coach pulled by an SW unit. We headed out to the turntable, detrained and then took a spin on the turntable. Then it was back to the depot and onto the bus for the ride back to the convention center.

In the afternoon I checked out a few clinics before heading back to the hotel to recharge, get some dinner and get back to the convention center for the evening clinics. At 7pm I attended a slide presentation on the Bangor & Aroostock and Maine Central prototypes. Then it was time for my two clinics. First up was a look at the prototype railroads of Northern New England, followed by a look at my layout and the design process I used to incorporate 5 railroads onto 1 layout.
A note about the convention center - it is a great location for presenting clinics, but I do find the opening and closing of the rear door distracting and noisy. Before I started I propped the door open to prevent this distraction. It seemed to work out OK and there was not to much noise from the outside hallway. I guess there isn't too much you can do about people coming and going I suppose, but it would be nice if the doors worked in such a way to not be so noisy. A small nit I suppose. Otherwise the convention center is a good location, clean and modern. Very nice are the abundant displays with up-to-date information on clinics throughout as well as outside each clinic room.

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