3233

Sunday was bitter cold. As I drove through a small town in the early hours of the morning, three electronic temperature gauges had a different reading in bright red. Ironic since red is the color of heat. The first said 17 degrees, the next 12 and the last was +7 degrees!!! I shivered in my coat and cranked up the heater one more notch.

A friend and I were heading to Steamtown, located in Scranton, PA, to take pictures of old railroad cars and steam engines whose days are long gone. Wooden cars rotting, metal cars rusting and both shedding their paint in unusually artistic ways sit quietly; a testament to their former glory. As I wandered around the cars, I wished they could tell me what they've seen, where they've been and about the passengers they carried.

At the far edge of the parking lot a massive, glossy black and gray steam engine sits on a section of rail looking quite impressive and in great shape for its age. In its heyday, the sound of its engine must have been deafening as it waited to leave the station.

It was the perfect morning to take photos as the sun cast an oblique light across the cars as we trudged through the snow from car to car.

Ironically, graffiti artists find these cars great canvases for their art and some of the cars sport new and vibrant color schemes. I would love to watch one of these artists as they do their art thing. It amazes me how accurate they are with a spray can.

From Steamtown we headed back to Lake Nockamixon where we found a lot of activity going on in spite of the bitter cold.

When we pulled into the parking lot, out on the far side of the lake were two ice surfing (not sure what they're called) rigs rapidly skimming across the surface of the ice. When they finally returned to shore, two older gentlemen climbed out of their sled like contraptions. Doesn't this look like it'd be fun to hop in and go for a spin? I so wanted to try it out but didn't have the nerve to ask either of them if I could, so I took photos instead. It's like wind surfing but with a sled.

While you might think I’m crazy to be out in this kind of weather, this gorgeous sunset complete with two ice fishermen in the distance, made it all worthwhile.

Namaste

Chris