DENVER — Canada’s Rocky Mountaineer launched its first all-U.S. route Sunday with the first departure from Denver of the “Rockies to the Red Rocks” daytime excursion to Moab, Utah.
The train utilizes leased Union Pacific SD70 locomotives pulling SilverLeaf coaches, former Canadian National cars from the 1950s which have been remanufactured with larger windows and wraparound glass at the roofline.
In Canada, the single-level cars are always accompanied by GoldLeaf domes, but those oversize cars won’t fit through the numerous tunnels along the route. However, the Colorado version offers a lounge car for passengers traveling in a premium class known as SilverLeaf-Plus.
The train follows the California Zephyr out of the Mile-High City at a leisurely pace for 185 miles to Glenwood Springs, Colo., where passengers stay overnight. The trip resumes its westward journey the next morning for 174 miles through Grand Junction, Colo.; scenic Ruby Canyon; and Thompson, Utah, to a control point 5 miles further west at Brendel, where the Cane Creek branch diverges to the south. It travels down the branch approximately 20 miles to a platform at Seven Mile, where buses take passengers to their hotel in Moab.
After the train is cleaned, another set of passengers boards the same afternoon for a reverse version of the trip — with an overnight stay at Glenwood Springs followed by a departure Tuesday morning for Denver.
At least initially, the excursions depart and arrive from Union Pacific’s yard in Denver at 36th Avenue and Wazee Street because the tour operator was unable to come to an agreement with Denver’s Regional Transportation District, which controls access to Denver Union Station.
Rocky Mountaineer spokeswoman Nicole Ford tells Trains News Wire the current arrangement “will allow us to arrive and depart at the scheduled times.” She adds, “We will continue to work with the multiple parties involved on the possibility of having our trains arrive and depart from Denver Union Station in the future.” The company has always planned motorcoach transfers between the train and hotels at each location. More than two dozen “Rockies to the Red Rocks” round trips have been scheduled through mid-November.
For more than a month, operating and onboard service crews have been participating in familiarization trips, although some were cancelled as a result of mudslides that blocked Glenwood Canyon [see “California Zephyr route closed by mudslides,” Trains News Wire, Aug. 2, 2021].
Veteran photographer, author, and Trains contributor Steve Patterson was aboard with other local guests during a training run last week, serving as would-be passengers while guides polished their commentary and newly hired attendants worked on their technique serving at-seat meals.
“One of the commenters asked me about the ‘tunnel district’ while others in hearing range listened,” Patterson says. “She returned to the front of the car and correctly explained to everyone how we were going through 25 tunnels within a track span of a mere 10 miles, hence, it was called the tunnel district — the most tunnels in the shortest railroad distance in the world — including Switzerland and my hometown Clinchfield (it has 17 tunnels in about 12 miles), giving ‘Steve’ credit on her microphone.”
He reports that there were a number of long delays waiting for other traffic on the training trip, including one involving Amtrak’s Zephyr, but UP dispatchers probably knew this was only a tune-up for the real thing.
Information on fares and packages is available at the Rocky Mountainer website.
What makes me worry are the delays. I wonder how often the train will really make it all the way to Moab instead of being turned around at Grand Junction?