Sultana heads to dock in Cambridge, MD |
The talks at the North Carolina RPM and the Chesapeake forum went well.
CAROLINA RPM
I carpooled to the Carolina RPM with Mike Pulaski. He lives in Richmond, about a 3.5 hour drive to Greensboro. So I drove to his house the night before. I had a chance to see his layout again on Friday and see his latest progress. We left his house at 500AM on Saturday and made it to the meet as it was getting started.
Butch Eyler had this display of cars weathering over time |
The meet was fairly small with about 50 attendees. They held it is a conference center for a small business. The facility is quite nice with couches and chairs in the foyer and snack room with free drinks and donuts, and later pizza for lunch. They had one track of clinics to attend.
The model display room was small with about 6 people showing models. The vendor room was also small. But I was happy that vendor Aaron Chamberlain was there with basic supplies as I purchased tools and phosphor bronze wires.
I attended most of the clinics. One tidbit I learned was that certain solder fluxes can be conductive. You need to be careful when soldering on printed circuit traces and use non-conductive flux.
I was the last speaker to present. By then, the meet had thinned out and perhaps 15 people were present for my talk. I think everyone enjoyed it.
On Saturday night we visited a large club layout in Greensboro, got caught in a heavy rains and saw several NS trains roll through town while eating dinner.
All in all it was a fun time. Thanks to Mike for driving and Amy for hosting me Friday night.
CHESAPEAKE FORUM
A few days later I drove to Easton to present another talk. That one was more oriented toward civil war railroad history. I think it went very well. The audience members asked a lot of questions. Later, the Chesapeake Forum coordinator sent me feedback comments and they were very positive. One person said they could, "listen for another hour."
Roger Sekera and his wife, Sue, were my hosts while in Easton. We operated his HO switching layout after the talk. He designed the layout with ideas from my article on the C&O Brooke Yard that I wrote over 20 years ago. It took the two of us about 2 hours to switch the car float and various industries.
Sue made a nice dinner and we enjoyed a walk around his lovey neighborhood.We crashed early after dinner. Thanks to Roger and Sue for hosting me.
The next morning I got up early and visited Blackwater Wildlife Refuge and the Pickering Audubon Center. I saw a lot of birds and got some good pictures.
On my way home I spotted the Sultana heading into the dock at Cambridge Maryland. Sultana is a replica of a Revolutionary War sailing vessel. I stopped to get some pictures of the Classic Chesapeake scene with the schooner and light house.
MYSTERY PROJECT
Here are more sneak peaks at part of the mystery project. Any idea what it might be?