Extended Freight Train Hop Episode 2: Chicago to Fort Madison

well one thing that happens that i have to remember about and try and avoid and be more careful of in the future so i uh sat by the side of the road after getting off of canadian pacific property in bensonville had myself some breakfast and got organized uh there's little flower beds they kind of have to take pride in that community so i had breakfast by the flowers and then walked to the bus stop and and made my way on various trains and buses etc and finally the last leg of it using uber i got to the willow springs yard [Applause] well i've made it to the other side of chicago this is the willow spring center motor facility i'm a little concerned i've got cameras here and it looks me like the yard bowl is just sitting down there watching blue card [Applause] i can't tell if this is a train getting ready to leave we're backing in it'll be a while before i understand this [Applause] and based on what i'm seeing i don't think this is going to be a daytime hop out here and the intermodal facility is very secure and you can't you know you don't ever want to go in there so when the trains make themselves up they stick out a ways from the facility well i was hoping that you know i would see them stopping in a position where i could get on but there's a bull that sits there you know security and then there's also a bnsf police vehicle you know labeled as such running up and down the tracks on occasion so it was pretty obvious that this was not a daytime deal so i killed some time this charges charging up my phone i had this guy roll in while i was sound asleep and ruined my map watch the trains uh and then i cut across the tracks to the west side uh even though it's an east-west line it's actually running north and south through here i cut across the tracks there's a giant wall that runs the length of the tracks up to where it crosses the road and that wall i think is really for blocking sound for the neighborhood right there but i don't know it may be for security reasons as well so on one side you've got a nature reserve on the other side you have this giant wall there's about four sets of tracks in between the two the tracks on the east side are for incoming trains the tracks on the west side are for departures so i went over there rolled out my sleeping bag because i was still tired even though i'd gotten a little nap and i passed out and then this wall is where stobe and ran out on a rail are trying to catch out to denver one night that's it right there just let's let's have faith we are up opposed to the head units he's gonna back me we gotta go there's many wells come on what the come on we can still make this stay here okay hey catch and you can see their train pulled all the way out and then backed in and then and then left and they caught it on the fly well that's really difficult for me at my age and carrying a big pack i don't think i could do it at least i you know i hope i don't ever have to do that so i sat there no trains even the ones that left never came down that far on my uh by that wall so they were going way too fast there was no way i could catch them even if i wanted to and so i finally realized that you know i'm wasting my time i'm afraid and that and by now it's getting dark which is what i wanted but there's cameras and people and it just i could see that this was just gonna be really really iffy so i was tired and i make bad decisions sometimes when i'm tired so for instance i flew the drone to scope out this whole thing i don't think i ever recorded the video because there's no video there so i apparently never press record but anyway i'll add some aerial you know google maps or something so you can see what this place is like but i finally realized what i was gonna have to do was take greyhound to fort madison because i was planning to go from willow springs to fort madison so that i could do some filming and whatnot so i uh decided i was just gonna have to walk over to the speedway about probably three quarters of a mile from where i was and i would uber into the greyhound station and take greyhound to fort madison to continue this trip just avoid willow springs all together right so i walked down there and i got looking and that wall actually ended a little bit before the yard and i kind of went up through some woods and figured out that yeah i could see where the trains were and i could see one's ready to leave um i couldn't the scanner interrupted when the guys was talking about which train it was sometimes you can pick out which train they're working on but there is a writable car right there probably a hundred foot in front of me and across an open area but i'm looking both ways and i don't see anybody i don't see a bull i don't see the conductor i don't see anybody working the train and then i hear on the scanner the conductor has the guy back up three cars to a join and my perfect ride moves down three cars so now it's about 150 foot to my left but still still there and then the train sits there and finally i just thought to hell with it man i came to ride trains let's go so i grabbed my crap ran across the open area or in my case walked very quickly across the open area climbed up on that train got my crap all up on there looked over the other side and there was the bull three cars ahead of me on the other side had that train not backed up those three cars i would have climbed onto that car right next to the bowl it probably would have been one of those things like oh hello well miracles of miracles i'm rolling out of willow springs and man security is just really tight here i got on this uh right in a container a dirty fix i got on work over the side of the car and the bowl off we go step two underway consider myself very lucky to be able to get out of here off we went the only problem that i had was that it was very cold and number two was that i didn't know for sure where this train was going most of them go at least through kansas city and on west but some of them cut off for dallas fort worth and one the one stobe and his buddy ran out on a railroad cuts off and goes through burlington and goes to denver and so you know i've got my hopes up that this thing doesn't do that it was very cold that night got below well below freezing and so i hunkered down and still tired i fell asleep and and uh pretty soon i heard the change in the sound of the wheels and i looked up and realized we're going across the madison swing bridge into fort madison and uh i packed up my stuff and the train stopped and i got off and that was that i cleared willow springs and and made it to fort madison but uh anyway so the adventure and the adventure continues if that's going to be in focus or not i made it to fort madison and this is where i sacked out just uh in an industrial area right by the railroad tracks train after train came through but i was i was beat and it is cold so i'm not getting out of my sleeping bag anytime too soon here uh i can hear a tugboat the mississippi is a stone throw uh off that way from me and by stone throw you'd have to have a pretty good arm but anyway i'm gonna get a bunch of photography done here today so i will catch up on video and whatnot but i wanted to get a shot of that tree over there with the sunrise i don't it's not something i normally see you

Channel: Jumping Off The Cliff

Views: 6,813

Rating: 4.9344263 out of 5

Keywords: full, time, rv, freight hoppin, train hopping, stobe the hobo, bnsf, willow springs, jumpingoffthecliff, jumping off the cliff, full time rv

Id: Gyds8cC52E0

Length: 13min 54sec (834 seconds)

Published: Tue May 04 2021