Supertrain in Calgary is coming up and I am toying with making the 1056 KM. trip. There are no big shows on the West Coast, at least nothing like Supertrain. Am I nuts? (no need to answer)
How far have you travelled to attend a train show? Was it worth the trip and the expense? Just wonderin.
Brent
"All of the world's problems are the result of the difference between how we think and how the world works."
I drove 140 miles to go to a Great American Trains Show (GATS) over in Monroeville, PA. It was worth it, as there were a number of manufacturers in attendance. Better than that was that I had the opportunity to meet and have lunch with Chip (Spacemouse) and his son, Shane.
Course that trip pales in comparison in distance to what you plan on doing, Brent. That's a haul!
Tom
https://tstage9.wixsite.com/nyc-modeling
Time...It marches on...without ever turning around to see if anyone is even keeping in step.
Roughly a hundred and twenty miles or so. Train shows vary, some not really worth attending and others are quite nice. It would really have to be a great show to travel 1056 km, but if you could work it in with doing other things, like a vacation I could see doing that.
Jarrell
3.5 hours each way.
Rio Grande. The Action Road - Focus 1977-1983
5 hours from Pennsylvania to the Amherst Train Show in West Springfield Massachusetts.
Seabeck, WA to Milwaukee, WI for the annual NMRA meeting and the National Train Show. - Mike
Three and half to four hours, for the Syraacuse NY show. Customs wasn't bad.
Two and a quarter hrs to take part in a show, as part of a club.
Dave
Went 10 times to the West-Springfield Big E train show which is 570 Km one way.
Went to Hartford Connecticut NMRA convention, 609 Km one way.
Went to Philadelphia Pa NMRA convention, 866 Km one way.
Went to Detroit Mi NMRA convention, 1054 Km one way.
And three times to the Tidewater train show in Virginia Beach Va, 1293 Km one way.
I am stretching the true a little with the Tidewater show as I alway make it coincide with my 2 weeks vacation at the beach.
Jack W.
BATMANHow far have you travelled to attend a train show? Was it worth the trip and the expense? Just wonderin.
The most I travel was around 112 miles (224 miles rt) to the National Train Show in Cincinnati.That was my first NTS..
Larry
Conductor.
Summerset Ry.
"Stay Alert, Don't get hurt Safety First!"
Farthest was at the 1996 National Narrow Gauge Convention in Durango. It was my first NNGC, roughly 1,000 miles one-way. But it was part of my typical vacation back then, two weeks in Colorado, riding trains, visiting museums, and off-roading to see the rest, along with camping, radio monitoring, and general relaxing.
I've still got a few kits I picked up then that I need to assemble. I was just thinking about building that second PSC DL-535E I picked up then the other day...
Mike Lehman
Urbana, IL
Knoxville, TN to Springfield, MA: don't know exact miles but around 900+. And that was in February! Brrrrr!!
-Bob
Life is what happens while you are making other plans!
160 miles to the National Train Show, when it was in Philadelphia, PA. This was worth it. Made it in a day. don't know that I would do it overnight.
Otherwise about 116 to Timonium, MD. (Used to be 68 miles but I retired moved a little south). This one's worth it, but not much more. Not as many dealers as there used to be.
OTOH I have smaller shows closer to me during the year. If I didn't, I might travel farther.
Enjoy
Paul
Other than driving across three states to get to the National Train Show last year, I usually limit my trips to a five hour drive, one way. I have no problem hitting the road at 5:00 A.M. to go to a great train show. There are are a number of other things I do while I'm gone to make it worth while. Sometimes I visit friends, stay the whole weekend, play tourist, visit museums, go visit layouts, cruise the antique stores, or simply go exploring.
As the T-shirt says; "This IS life, this is not a dress rehearsal!"
The Cedar Branch & Western--The Hillbilly Line!
580 miles each way to the 2006 National Train Show in Philadelphia, and 670 miles each way to the Amherst Model RR Club's show in Springfield, Mass. in 2013.
Both trips turned out to be worth it.
The 2006 trip was a spur-of-the-moment thing where on Wednesday my brother and I decided that we hadn't been on a road trip in a while, so we decided to drive down to the show Friday night/Saturday morning, returning right after the show closed Saturday. Since he started from west of Chicago, his trip was more like 790 miles.
We hadn't counted on the baseball All-Star game being played in Pittsburgh that weekend when we tried to find a hotel on the way back Saturday night. It took several hours to find any vacancy at all.
-Fritz Milhaupt, Publications Editor, Pere Marquette Historical Society, Inc.http://www.pmhistsoc.org
Yesterday I drove two hours (109 miles one way) to bring my T-Trak modules for a show in Albany NY. I usually go to Springield in January which is also around 109 miles. Twice I went to Alco museum in Schnectady NY with my N Trak modules for a show there, 130 miles one way. Next Sunday i'll be in Kingston NY for a show which is 58 miles from my home.
BATMAN Am I nuts?
Am I nuts?
Yes
Alton Junction
Travelled from Canada's Maritime provinces to Seattle, WA to attend the NMRA convention in 2004 - one end of the continent to the other. The real purpose of our trip was to take a cruise from Seattle to Alaska, timed it to coincide with the convention. Took the cruise, returned on Sunday when the convention started. Worked out pefectly! Didn't buy much because we were flying, but did come home with a couple of contest plaques, one for a photo and one for my model railroad pass.
Bob Boudreau
CANADA
Visit my model railroad photography website: http://sites.google.com/site/railphotog/
I've driven to the Amherst show in West Springfield, MA, and the NMRA show in Hartford, CT, a few years back. I'm lucky enough that these are only an hour and a half to two hours from home, all easy highway driving when the weather is good. I can day trip it easily.
I'm fortunate to have several good shows a year within an easy half-hour to one hour drive.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
I did train shows pretty frequently when I lived in PA.
125 miles from Reading PA to Timonium MD...by way of Harrisburg.
I don't do them anymore. The nearest one is Roseville CA in Nov at 140 miles. Can't drive that far anymore and even if I could , I won't cross the Sierra Nevada Mts at that time of year.
Mark H
Modeling in HO...Reading and Conrail together in an alternate history.
Charlotte, NC to Timmonium, MD. By Amtrak, incidentally. It must have been worth it because we have done it more than once and the spousal unit is beginning to make noises about it being time to do it again.
Lackawanna Route of the Phoebe Snow
When I still lived in Ohio, I would make the trip from Dayton to Teledo twice a year, 150 miles one way. Always a good show with several hunderd tables, well worth the trip. Since moving to western Colorado, I drove to a show in Denver, 250 miles one way. Less than 50 tables. Not a complete waste of time, but pretty close. Out here we have sking, hunting, fishing, hiking, mountain biking, but train shows? nada!
900 miles, round trip. Was it worth it? Definitively yes - three days of fun, as I was one of the operating crew members of a large display layout, showing how railroading was in the good old days. We used a timetable, fast clock and telephone. I still had plenty of time to check what´s on the market and take a close look at our "competitors" layouts.
I routinely go 150 miles to the Timonium train shows. Lately after crossing the Chesapeake Bay bridge, I get on the light rail to complete the trip. Saves all that driving on the Baltimore beltway and the crazy drivers.
Elmer.
The above is my opinion, from an active and experienced Model Railroader in N scale and HO since 1961.
(Modeling Freelance, Eastern US, HO scale, in 1962, with NCE DCC for locomotive control and a stand alone LocoNet for block detection and signals.) http://waynes-trains.com/ at home, and N scale at the Club.
gandydancer19 I routinely go 150 miles to the Timonium train shows. Lately after crossing the Chesapeake Bay bridge, I get on the light rail to complete the trip. Saves all that driving on the Baltimore beltway and the crazy drivers.
I agree. We take Amtrak from Charlotte to Baltimore and the light rail to Timonium. We don't even take the car. We leave it at the Amtrak station in Charlotte.
About 2 hrs one-way is the furthest I've gone, which is roughly about 110-130 miles, depending on the route taken and traffic. For where I live now, that would be the Timonium shows. It's hard for me to justify going that far for a train show, though. When I consider how much I typically spend at a show (~$100 or less), then factor in the time taken out of my day, the gas to get there and back, and the price of admission... I might as well stay home and order stuff from the Internet.
Still, it's hard to beat train shows for finding some good deals and those hard-to-find small dollar value items (detail parts and such). A bonus with Timonium shows is that MB Klein is just down the road, so it's basically a mandatory stop. I can take advantage of their great prices without having to pay shipping
Dan Stokes
My other car is a tunnel motor
I drove about 200 miles one way to the train show in Evanston WY. It was a nice outing with my wife. That show is in the old Union Pacific roundhouse and proceeds benefit the restoration and repurposing of the roundhouse. It will eventially be a community center, conference center, and city offices. They are restoring and keeping the turntable, and at the show they offered free turntable rides (Not exactly thrilling, but it was kind of neat - four minutes per revolution).
Yes, worth the trip.
Phil, I'm not a rocket scientist; they are my students.
About 250 miles one way.
Russell
The longest distance I've ever driven to a train show was about 65 miles. Anything beyond that is too far for me. Sorry but there's nothing I have to have that bad...
Tracklayer
98 miles from the west side of Columbus (Ohio) to the rail festival in Fostoria in the fall.
Kevin
http://chatanuga.org/RailPage.html
http://chatanuga.org/WLMR.html