Maybe the third time is the charm. I have started this post twice before, both times loosing it by an errant click that took my browser to a different page
From the Best Laid Plans dept: Late Sunday morning I decided to get the railroad in shape to be able to run some switching ops and take photos along the way. First I needed to mow the front lawn to bag the good amount of leaves that had already fallen. Then run the leaf blower through the entire layout to clear it of leaves, pine needles, Maple seeds and twigs. Once that was done I put together a MOW train powered by M-10 to carry my tools around. The MOW train made many stops to clear overgrown vegetation, redistribute ballast that had washed over the track and clean out all 6 switches on the Outdoor Div. to get them back to normal function. By the time this was complete (and the back yard mowed) I had covered every inch of the layout and was running out of daylight. Unfortunately a camera did not accompany the MOW train.
Not to be denied my early fall pictures; I rushed home from work today arriving by 5 and had a train built and out on the layout by 5:30. Even then I was beginning to loose light as the sun was getting low about to slip behind the mountain to my West. I did manage to snap nearly 100 shots at various spots around the layout. Many of them are in the round file, but the best are presented here for your enjoyment.