Last Sunday (June 27) I had open house for the Orange County Garden Railway Society and neighborhood with ~80 people in attendance over a period of about 3 hours. Mick and Liz Spilsbury from the Bay Area Garden Railway Society and Carla Breitner from Santa Clarita Valley Garden came down for the showing. They put out the GRNews Newsletter and host the website. I asked Carla for some photos of the old build challanges shown in place because this has never happened.
This first pic is “Willie the Wonder Horse” doing his thing. Some may recall that Willie originally powered the “California Experience” where the challange was to make something “round.”
A couple challanges later we were tasked with using provided ceramic “capstones” in the build. In this case we came up with the Ernest and Julio Gallows and Dunk Tank where the townsfolk take the law into their own hands and throw balls at a target to hang the villains. In this case it was the three brothers in the Taylor Clan trying to “claim jump” the Widow Maker Mine. Note one on the gallows in the blindfold having a last “smoke,” one on the way with the “hoody,” and the third in the cell awaiting his fate. On weekends the local “barmaids” provide fodder for the dunk tank. That’s the engine for the “Low Rider” train getting “tagged” in the foreground.
The most recent MIK’s Challange build was to use a can and we came up with the “Can” that is tipped.
Note the color on the rock from people scraping their trailers/vehicles. (I’m a stickler for extreme detail.)
And it works too.
