Heber Creeper Labor Day

As a mother of three sons, I have always maintained that little boys fasten onto one particular type of toy, which becomes their reason for living; the topic of all their conversations; their identity. There are truck boys, who love large construction vehicles; there are dinosaur boys, who love dinosaurs more than anything; but all three of my boys have been train boys. They lived for trains of all kinds. We'd never taken the whole family on the Heber Creeper, a traditional steam engine up in the Heber Valley, and I decided to remedy that on Labor Day. But then Sebastian went off with a friend so we had an extra ticket. We invited our cousin Monkey-Chicken (which is his family alias) along, who is as much a train boy as any of mine.

Joss and M-C were thrilled to see the Heber Creeper pull in.

We also brought along these two clowns.

We got seats in one of the restored cars (my, those train passengers had no knees!).

At first it was exciting enough just to feel the train moving (this guy doesn't remember riding 

trains on his two Study Abroads, though I won't forget it any time soon -- he was quite a hell raiser).

The weather was nice enough to have the windows open and stick your head out the window.

It is also a beautiful valley.

Then they began the entertainment. These two fiddlers were phenomenal. Their playing was great, everything was memorized, and they were doing it all on a swaying train!

Then came the dance party, and Monkey-Chicken and Fluff got out in the aisle and busted some moves.

 Unfortunately you can't see the full range of M-C's dance abilities without a floor where he can do his breakdancing.

But he still gave it his all. He's got the rhythm in him, that Monkey-Chicken!

It was a successful trip to the Heber Creeper with some very happy train boys.