I got up early to ride down to breakfast at the Cajun Kitchen and remembered to take my camera so stopped along the way to take a few shots. I’m always fascinated by the flare stack just south of the Rincon and it being early took a few shots of it from far and near. The last three are pretty fun too, a Shasta trailer won by the owners on the television show “Let’s Make a Deal” in 1961!
As I rode by the mouth of the Ventura River I was shocked by how much it has changed since I had seen it over many years as a peaceful sandy lagoon with very few rocks. Click on the images below to see how things used to be then watch my short YouTube for what has happened recently.
Union Pacific was doing a lot of track maintenance and upgrading as I rode by. One of the more interesting units was this track tamper, I think quite fascinating. I found the YouTube below showing how the machine works. Here is the description that with the original YouTube: “The mechanism on the front lets the rest of machine know how much a certain section of track needs to be raised. Then, a claw picks up the rail and ties and spikes poke down into the ballast, pushing it under the track. Once the tamper completed its job, a ballast regulator came through to smooth out the rocks.”