serendipity
Spent today at the Woodstock Model Train Show with Luc Sabourin and met his friend Nad Qureshi. I have a really great story about a very nicely weathered autorack that I bought from Nad… but that is a story for another day.
On the way back from the Show I had to detour off of the 401 due to a major accident. My mild displeasure (that my 90 minute drive home would take longer) turned to pleasure as I came upon this scene.
QGRY 2500 (a GP35 originally built in 1965 for the Southern Pacific) had been reassigned to the Goderich-Exeter Railway (GEXR). I had previously photographed QGRY 2500 in October 2013 in the Ste-Thérèse (Montreal) QGRY yard; and here she was again looking a little worse for wear but still working hard to earn her keep.
Today I spotted QGRY 2500 at Hunt Logistics in Cambridge, Ontario. 2500 was parked at the time but was about to pull (or had just pushed) three cars into the Hunt Logistics spur. The rest of the train was parked 400m to the south. [EDIT: According to the comments I received on this post, QGRY 2500 may not have been working as hard as I thought when I found her parked. Seems like this may be the spot that this engine is parked when not working. Thanks to all who commented.]
I love unexpected railfanning! It was especially nice to come upon a QGRY locomotive completely by accident…. and a perfect end to another great model railroad day.
Was there a crew around on the engine, or was it (as I kinda expect) just idle?
Apparently GEXR has an assigned switch job that is based in Cambridge, and they keep an engine parked in this area, although there is no specific yard or track for this purpose, so I think you just found where it is normally parked.
BTW I think there are something like three or four QGRY units in southern Ontario spread between GEXR and SOR in Hamilton & Nanticoke.
No crew around that I saw, so maybe it was just parked as you suggested.