This shot epitomises the expansion of the Union Pacific empire in the mid '90's.

Power has former C&NW C42-8 8569 on the point, SP B30-7 7855, and finally UP SD60 6284.

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My two hours here, on a Sunday morning, netted ten trains, unfortunately six of them were against the sun.

Nonetheless the power was quite interesting, and here UP SD40-2 3497 leads SP SD70M 9803, more commonly found on the I-5 corridor! By this time the SP/ D&RGW had also joined the yellow empire.

The bridge above the third autorack was where I was standing for the first two eastbounds, which were climbing away from Cheyenne. The purpose of moving along the bank was to get a full picture of an eastbound train passing the famous pole here, which will be the subject of the next uploads.

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Another mixed bag followed with the next drag, being UP SD40-2 3595, Norfolk Southern C36-7 8524, UP GP38-3L 2502 and C&NW C44-9W 8629.

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The day before my trip up to the Powder River had been the first of this trip. Not wishing to go too far after flying into Denver the night before, I started my day at this popular spot a little to the east of Cheyenne on the Union Pacific mainline.

The C&NW had quite recently been absorbed into the yellow empire, and here one of their C44-9W's 8701 leads four original UP SD40-2's, being 3841, 3952, 3205 and another 33xx.

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This also appeared now on the downhill stretch into Cheyenne.

A pair of C&NW C44-9W's lead, 8647 and 8707, with UP SD40-2 3187 on the rear. By now a lot of the C&NW locos were looking a bit uncared for, a shame as a return from Zito to the original yellow gave these locos a real touch of class in my view.

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