We took Lailah to see the “night trains” at Bandana Square on Saturday night (Energy Park Drive, between Snelling & Lexington – close to the state fair grounds).
If you’ve not heard of this place, it’s a former railroad locomotive engine servicing facility originally built in the late 1800’s (not a typo), and now since converted into offices, etc. Within this building complex, there is the Twin City Model Railroad Museum, housing a scale model of a portion of the Twin Cites, along with the railroad lines running thru MPLS/STP.
I guess I’ve not visited there in the recent yrs since I was surprised to see an “annex” where many more (smaller in size) model railroads are housed, ranging from “G” (outdoor Garden) scale, several “O” (1950s-1960s Lionel) scale layouts, and including a few “HO” (the hobby’s most popular scale) layouts, and there was even a small “N” scale layout (the scale I model in).
When we arrived, Lialah (as per her norm on excursions such as these), had fallen asleep during the drive, so I carried her in, with her still sleeping on my shoulder, and walked around these layouts, the overhead ceiling lights were off, and only the lights on the layouts were lit, meaning, if the modelers put lights in their model buildings, you saw those lit up, as well as the locomotive engines being lit with their front headlight, etc.
After walking around for a bit (carrying her), Lailah started slowly waking up, and once fully awake, she and I walked around the layouts once more, with me still carrying her, but this time, she was facing outward and watching the trains as they sped past her.
Most layouts had several one-step stools for the younger kids to step on, bringing their faces closer to “the action” (as opposed to looking downward from a 6’5″ shoulder), and she enjoyed that as well, occasionally pointing with her tiny finger: “Look, GranPa, there’s a ‘Northern Pacific 2-8-8-2′ steam loc’. [boy, I must be rubbing off on her, she’s really knows her locs].
Some of you, if you’re my age or a few yrs older, may remember “Lionel” trains – these are the “fairly” large trains – each engine or freight car being a foot long – anyway, Lionel was “famous” for making “interactive” accessories, such as track side carousels, or freight cars that would dump their load, at a touch of a button. Well, most of the “O” scale layouts here had several accessories and Lailah (like the rest of the kids there), really liked pushing all the buttons for these accessories and watching them do their thing.
She and I had a great time seeing all the “night trains”.
