Razzbary Pond Railroad is a fictional G scale railroad in my backyard. It was started in 2001 with the idea of getting rid of leaves from a rose garden in the spring, by digging a hole and putting the mulched leaves in. When that was done, I had three mounds of dirt and two trenches in my old vegetable garden that had two types of Raspberries. Got some track and created a small diorama for a logging operation and put construction poly in the holes to hold water. That lasted about a week before the ideas starting filling my head. I went on eBay to see what was out there and starting planning and buying for the future. Several auctions later, USA billboard refer cars were my favorite, I had enough to start laying track, used LGB track and switches, with no idea what I was doing or where I was going.
Plants never crossed my mind. Just let nature dictate what was to stay and what I should pull. Put in 10 dwarfs Alberta spruce for scenery and a couple of perennials to try. Add three or four perennials a year and kept the ones that worked and removed the ones that didn’t. After a few years and more auctions, for rolling stock, I still did not have much of an idea what I was up to. Joined MGRS and started going to open houses for some guidance (many ideas) and found that it did not matter too much about the garden until the track was all used and the plants started to fill in.
Starting small and worked to improve something, anything, one month at a time. Laid track flat on the ground over weed stop that helped clear the grasses and weeds in the yard until a friend gave me some broken Hardy Board planks 1” by 3 ½”, I found was a fit for the width of the ties and was a way to keep the track in place by stapling the track to the planks with braid nails, without having to put down tons of ballast. It made it easy to blow off leaves with a leaf blower.
I have 7 engines. One set of F-3 AB diesel locomotives with the Amtrak colors, with Sierra sound in the B unit. Two Bachmann 4-6-0 steam engines with the Reading Railroad line name. One Bachmann 4-6-0 battery operated, one Aristo craft Lil Critter and a GP38 with Delaware and Hudson colors. There is 378 feet, nine switches of live track I run trains on. A large outside loop with a siding between the ponds, a second loop around the ponds, another inside loop with a siding past an Ice House connected to the outside loop through two switches. I can connect the whole track through one power supply or connect with two power supplies and run separate tracks. I have run two 4-6-0s on the same track with no problems.
Found I like to build buildings with scale lumber from Smith Pond Junction. I have several I have built over the long winter months that look great on the layout. Then there are the bird houses that are out there day after day. The vehicles, people, animals, and all the rest of the props to make Razzbary Pond Railroad come to life.
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