POTD: Grande Gold Set In White Gold

Snow is certainly fitting today's photo as most of the state and especially the high country is coping with a fresh deposit of the white stuff. Of course, it's white gold to the ski areas, who just saw their high-drift mark of the 2015 ski season, Presidents' Day Weekend. If you haven't gotten up to the slopes, what are you waiting for? A Ski Train?

On the last day of January, 1966, it was a different sort of ski train that was kicking up the fallen snow in Fraser Canyon. You can almost smell the wind whipping the diesel and blowing snow crystals freezing your nose. Photographer Steve Patterson leans out the fireman's side of the locomotive cab to grab a shot of the consist as they blast through a turn on the way to Craig with the Yampa Valley Mail.

Photo of the Day: Steve Patterson

Of the nature of the train's ski element, veteran photographer Steve Patterson notes,

The last two cars carried skiers to Winter Park, and those cars will be handed off to counterpart Train 10 wherever they meet, and then pick up those skiers and take them back to Denver. The round-end dome Observation car was acquired from the C&O.

The dome observation car was certainly different than the all-silver sides of the California Zephyr. Even amongst clerestory roofed pullmans painted in matching Grande gold, it's hard to hide a vista dome in her native territory.

Sharp-eyed readers will note that it's not just any cab unit pulling the train. Perhaps it's a hint of a theme for later this week?◊