Train fans climb aboard historic railway

BONSAL -- The No. 17 steam engine left the tiny Bonsal train station shortly after noon Sunday, pulling three cars filled with more than 200 riders.

A dark plume billowed out of the locomotive's smokestack. Streaks of white steam shot up as the whistle blew. The New Hope Valley Railway's first steam engine ride of the season took off on its bumpy and noisy nine-mile trip.

Among those on board were a little boy wearing a Thomas the Tank Engine T-shirt, a grandmother in a colorful Indian sari and a woman in a wheelchair.

Debbie Gorman of Clearlake, Calif., celebrated her 55th birthday by riding the train with children and grandchildren she and her husband were visiting in Willow Spring. Last year, she rode in an open train car right behind an old steam engine in Colorado and got covered in soot, Gorman said.

"This time," she said, "I'm sitting in a covered car."

Jonathan Suskin, 5, of Cary savored every whistle blow and every coupler clunk. Eyes trained ahead, he was clutching his ticket in one hand and a tall lemonade in the other.

"I like train rides," he said and beamed at his father, Jacin, who held Jonathan's sister, Elizabeth, 3, on his lap.

For 20 years, Triangle train nuts large and small have flocked to Bonsal, a small community about half an hour southwest of Raleigh, to ride the New Hope Valley Railway.

The historic train rides, which run the first Sunday of the month from May through November, draw about 1,000 passengers a day. Evening rides on the weekend closest to Halloween, which can attract witches and vampires, are particularly popular. Tickets are usually sold out weeks in advance.

Ridership is down about 30 percent this year, said Bob Crowley, corporate secretary of the New Hope Valley Railway. He suspected skyrocketing gas prices are to blame. But he was optimistic that business will improve.

The volunteer organization, which counts about 100 members, maintains and operates seven locomotives. No. 17 is the only one that runs on steam, one of fewer than 100 steam engines still in operation in the U.S.

Built under a military contract in 1941, the engine was used to transport building materials in a Camden, N.J., shipyard during World War II. Later it transported stone in a quarry.

The New Hope Valley Railway bought the steam engine about 10 years ago and restored it.

Mike MacLean, a 33-year-old computer programmer with a mechanical engineering degree from N.C. State University, is No. 17's engineer. It's a hot and dirty job, but MacLean said hearing the locomotive bark up a hill is worth it.

"I get to work with wrenches that are huge," he said, holding up one that was 24 inches long. "If I brought that to work, the security guard would escort me out."

No. 17 pulled its passengers about four miles south, on a track that was built in the 1970s and was used to transport the building materials for the Shearon Harris nuclear plant. Then the engine uncoupled, passed on a parallel track, attached to the other end and pulled the cars back to Bonsal.

Jonathan commented on every railroad crossing, duly announced by No. 17 's whistle, and the creek crossing.

Meanwhile, his sister had different priorities. She slept through most of the ride.