Sunday, February 6, 2005 dawned with bright sunny blue skies.   I spent the morning with several of my friends in town bowling.  Then around noon I headed for the tracks.  Unfortunately from Spokane everything looked pretty much clouded up now.  Originally I had planned on heading to the Seattle line for the afternoon but now I wasn't sure.  I drove to Yardley first where there were a few locomotives sitting around the yard and the Kettle Falls Local was tied down ready to depart later in the night.  Over the scanner I new there were several eastbounds and westbounds in the area so I decided to head out towards Sprague in hopes of some sun.   On the way out of town I missed two eastbound hopper trains one from Pasco and the other off the Seattle line.

     I caught up to the M-LAUPAS as it was crossing Latah Creek Bridge on the west side of Spokane.  Then I heard the detector for MP 371.5 go off and I knew that it was following another westbound.  So after a quick drive down to Marshall I caught up to the rear of a southbound Boardman Coal train.  I could see that there was sun to the west so I chased the train to Cheney where I set up for it.   Just before it arrived the Z-PTLCHC raced by on the BNSF tracks (BNSF 5307, 4743, CSX 5004, NREX 5474).  Then the southbound Boardman arrived pulling hard on its heavy load of coal (BNSF 9865, EMD 9031, 9088, 9060).   I decided that I would chase the coal train down to Wells and then after shooting it there I would have plenty of time to find a spot for the westbound BNSF trains.  Well around 2pm the coal train pulled out of Wells siding with plenty of sun. 

    After the train passed I hopped back in the car and headed over to Sprague for a quick set up just east of town.  The M-LAUPAS arrived shortly and rolled on down through town (BNSF 8014, 8026, ATSF 6857(patched)).  I wanted to get back up towards Fishtrap for the next westbound hopper train which I knew would be right behind it.  But the clouds covered the sun all the way until I met the train so after a quick turn around I headed back west.  I decided to catch it at Pilfer which is about halfway between Sprague and Keystone so I quickly headed in that direction.  I reached the desired spot with just enough time to set up before it arrived (EMD 9010, NREX 5469, BN 8007, ATSF 6871(both patched)).   I didn't know of any more trains in the area and since it looked sunny up on the Seattle line I decided to head that way.

      Instead of going back to Sprague and up the main road I figured that I could just take a short cut on the gravel roads.  Well it turned into a long hour before I finally managed to make it up to Canby but in the meantime I somehow found just about every little, muddy road possible.  I spent the next 2 hours or so waiting around for a train but unfortunately nothing showed up and the sun set.  I got a few sunset photos of tracks, barns etc...and then headed back to Edwall and down to Sprague.  When I arrived I met an eastbound manifest train and so chased it up to Fishtrap (BNSF 5020, BN 9268(patched)).  Taking a few more shots I decided to head to Marshall Canyon and try some night photography.  After a couple attempts that didn't work out it was gone and I found a westbound hopper train.  I got a couple photos at Anderson Rd crossing and then turned the car towards home.  It was a fun day even though the train traffic was less than desirable on the Seattle line and I wasted a lot of time getting there.