I was ecstatic about the trolley apparatus--the poles we found are not just hard to find, they're astoundingly rare!
Back to the tour! Since I have covered most all of what remains between Tunnel 15 and Deer Lodge, we'll resume coverage in Deer Lodge. Deer Lodge was a major maintenance shop for the MILW electrics. A substantial complex once stood here, and little is left. In town, as a display that includes the E70, and the Golden Spike sculpture that once stood at Gold Creek, further west. Here's the historic spike: Here's a series of signs around the monument, and the E70:
Little Joe E70 has seen very little TLC in its years as a tourist trap in Deer Lodge; but in 2009, it has been treated to a fresh coat of orange, maroon and black!
Morel Substation #7 was nestled along the shores of a large lake/holding area for warer. It was not easy to find, and definitely hard to locate among the weeds! I looked for bungalow foundations, but couldn't find them.
Not much is around to be seen from Morel to Butte, but there's a few items of interest. The ROW near Morel is also a local dirt road (if you want to call it a "road"--it's very rough, and the trestles along this ROW are also used by vehicle traffic. Here's an interesting structure built on a MILW pile trestle: And here's one that's succombing to nature and time: Next is Butte. Butte is a tough mining town, and it boasted one of the MILW's 5 grand brick Montana depots. Here's the current KXLF TV station building: Daylight's fading fast, and we wanna find Janney Substation 6's foundation! Stay tuned!
As we scamble out of town to Janney, we are surprised to spot another relic of the MILW: Butte Yard! Weather beaten, vandalized, and forlorn, Butte Yard is pretty beaten-up, but a welcome sight to see tracks still in place! Who runs on these rails now? Looking north: South:
Butte Yard was vacant, so I'll assume it sees very little traffic. Does it interchange with MRL out of Garrison? We trucked it on out to Janney, which was easy enough to find, once we asked a local of its location. Janney was a monster-capacity substation, after the 1955 addition of Cleaveland Union Terminal's motor-generator sets. 7500KW worth of power was available at Janney after 1955. Even before then, Janney's 3 M-G sets were still worth 6000KW! The CUT M-G was installed in a metal shed on Janney's east end. The Railroad Press issue #82 (pg 24) has a wonderful shot of Janney's shed.
After Janney, we headed east of Janney, along the ROW road: Nothing fancy here, just a shot out over the hood. I didn't even get out of the truck! The road was blocked with a gate, and we asked a local about the location of Blacktail Tunnels 1 & 2, and using his directions, we drove out to the highway, and up into a new gravel road, winding around, and parked at a specific area. Hiking up the hill, this was our reward:
While browsing for MILW photos on RP.net, I found a neat shot at Butte Yard, back before the trolley was dead, back in the good old days. Compare with post # 327: http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=52647
As we descended into the cut, there seemed to be a lot of clutter strewn about. The closer we got to the ROW, the more this "clutter" looked to be of electrification significance.... The trolley wires were suspended above the track using these insulated, taut cables stretched high above the rails. Imagine them still perched where they belong atop poles, as you saw near Tunnel 15: At this elevation, high on Pipestone Pass above Janney, the poles were salvaged, and the trolley aparatus was unceremoniously chain-sawed off, and left to decay: A pole of some sort was installed here, and again, unceremoniously torched off with the gas axe: More trolley paraphenalia--Ken, can you tell me what these J-shaped metal rods are?
The earthworks atop Pipestone Pass are incredible, and are everywhere! A lot of heavy construction was required to cut the railroad thru this 6000+ foot elevation landscape: At last, another tunnel; the last since aptly named Garrison Tunnel 14.. Blacktail #2 Tunnel 13 West portal: East portal: The group of hikers provided the directions to the top of the hill to reach the ROW. Many thanks, you folks!
Blacktail #1 Tunnel 12 West portal: Refuge inside said tunnel, with some intact codeline: East Portal: Signal foundation a few dozen yards outside the east portal: As you can tell it was getting REALLY dark, and I could no longer handhold a shot, thanks to double-digit shutter speeds; and in between swatting skeeters, and date nail collecting, we still needed to drive out, and find a campspot, and set up! Needless to say, Mike and I became quite adept at setting up camp in lanternlight. This trip owes as much thanks to BF Goodrich for the incredibly tough, abuse-absorbing tires (and they sure had a torture test atop Pipestone Pass' "roads") as it does to Coleman, and their propane lantern!
After driving to Homestake Pass, and camping at 6400 feet, we arose the next morning at first light to finish more of Pipestone. We wanted to find Grace, and Fish Creek Tunnel 10, but my maps didn't help us. Driving out to Whitehall, we made a beeline south for Piedmont, in search of Substation #5's foundation. About a half hour of driving around the location I felt the SS to be was fruitless, and we went west in hopes of finding Vendome Loop. The highway led nearly right to the Loop. Well, it led to the beginning of the Loop. Here's the view from the overpass to Piedmont: And west at Vendome Station: One can almost makeout the foundation for the station, and follow the ROW north. We didn't get close enough to get an overhead shot of the loop, so this is our only photo of the famous (imfamous?) location. In hindsight, we could have parked, and hiked in, but too many fences,a nd no cover to hide us from what could be the landowner driving down the same highway... The road that led to the bottom and top levels of the loop was closed/blocked. Bummer. It shows in several Loop photos, but this was not the time to go boondockin'. We had other things to find, and Donald was our aim. Back to the main pass highway, and we drove right past East Donald and its siding location as we neared the summit. Pipestone Pass Tunnel 11 was next!
We actually parked at a summit turnoff, and hiked east, but I'll take you from east Donald, and head west. Without further ado, this concrete foundation sits near east Donald: Ken, what was it for? Another signal foundation: The summit tunnel, Pipestone Pass Tunnel 11, east portal: The tunnel is structurally compromised in a way that makes it unsafe, hence the fence (I'm a poet, and didn't know it):
The MILW's tunnels are characteristically egg-shaped, and it's graphically illustrated in that last photo... The view from the summit, looking east: And west at the west portal: The overgrown trees sure block out a lot of shot possibilities! The steep scree slope to the tunnel portal was too slick to scale down, so we took a longer route that yielded this shot: And a closer view:
Not much to see at the west portal, so west we hiked. This signal foundation (and a twin opposite the ROW) stood at West Donald: Ignore the photographer's shadow--doh! Blacktail Viaduct is about a mile from the summit tunnel, so let's see it! Blacktail Viaduct has intact trolley poles, if only the crossarms still clung to trolley wire: A closeup of the trolley pole brackets: All you can see from the main pass highway:
