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On Sunday, he and a crew led more than 600 people on backwoods tours of the Shenandoah Valley. Each fall excursion travels the short-line of the historic Shenandoah Valley Railroad, a route that runs from Verona to Pleasant Valley, just south of Harrisonburg.

The tours will continue through October — when the Valley’s fall foliage is at its peak — every Sunday and every other Saturday, said Ben True, operations manager of the railroad.

True said the two-hour tour offers an increasingly rare perspective — that of the trainmen who work the line day in and day out.

Freight trains carrying feed, propane, lumber and ink still run the line during the week. But on weekends, five passenger cars and two locomotives tote passengers on the 30-mile roundtrip.

A Family Event

As the train sped through the countryside, families gathered in the open-air platforms between the refurbished 1940s Pullman passenger coaches.

You don’t see this side of the Valley much, said Ellen Lockhart of Staunton. She brought her 4-year-old grandson, Brooks Dill, along.

“I just love trains,” she said. “He really does too.”

Decked out in a Thomas the Tank Engine sweatshirt, Dill pumped his fist in the air, imitating the train’s horn. It was his first time on board a train.

Barry and Jan Lamberts’ boys had never ridden a train either. The Harrisonburg family also brought out-of-town relatives along for the ride.

Their oldest boy, Delan, 6, was diagnosed with leukemia in April.

“He really hasn’t been able to do anything this year,” Jan Lambert, 39, said.

Delan has just finished up a round of chemotherapy. “He’s been waiting to ride,” Barry Lambert, 42, said.

Waving at cows through the open-air platform, Delan explained why he loved the train ride so much.

“It feels like a carnival ride,” he said, turning back to the countryside rushing by at 25 miles an hour.

Railroad Has Long History

The novelty of the excursion is one of the tour’s biggest selling points, True said.

A trip down the Shenandoah Valley Railroad offers an uncommon view of the unassuming alley of farmland that lies between U.S. 11 and Interstate 81.

Leaving Verona, passengers peered down from the trestles more than 85 feet above the Middle River, as if from treetops. As the train pulled into Fort Defiance, walls of rock rose high above the track, surrounding the train in a valley of solid stone.

Railroad workers once blasted away fragments of the mountain and hand-dug those trenches when the line was first built in 1872.

The railroad’s roots date back to 1866, when the Valley Railroad Company was created with the goal of linking Harper’s Ferry to Salem. Although Robert E. Lee, the line’s second president, worked to raise enough money to start construction, he never saw the start of the 25-mile stretch that would eventually link Harrisonburg and Staunton. The line was built two years after the confederate general’s death.

The Chesapeake & Western bought the line in 1895. The C&W name survived many mergers and is still known to some enthusiasts at the “Crooked & Weedy.”

In 1993, the Greater Shenandoah Valley Development Corporation purchased 20 miles of the track, forming the modern-day Shenandoah Valley Railroad.

This is the second year the railroad has operated the fall tours. It’s an important service, said Frank Nolen, president of the corporation.

“All businesses need to be involved in the communities we take money out of,” he said.

It’s why the company started the tours last year, leading 4,600 people on 12 excursions in the fall of 2005. This year, they’ve expanded to 16 trips.

In future years, Nolen says he hopes the tours can start in Staunton.

“Any chance we get for people to experience this culture, we want to give them,” Nolen said.

Keenan, the train’s conductor, agreed.

“The young folks, they don’t know what it’s like,” he said. “The old people, they all know what to expect.”

A lot of younger folks, he said, were surprised to get their ticket punched. He tells them it’s not like it is at the airport. A lot of kids don’t expect the train to rock and sway, he said.

“They’re conditioned to airplanes,” he said. “They’re used to, ‘Stay in your seat. Keep your seat belts buckled.’ They don’t realize they can walk around.”

But by the time the train turned back to its starting point outside the Augusta County Government Center in Verona, they seemed to have caught on. Although some passengers were content to cuddle up with a book, most socialized up and down the aisles, filling the throughways.

“We’re not all train enthusiasts here,” Keenan said. “But we can all enjoy a bit of this fall weather the old-fashioned way.”

Fall Excursions tickets are available through October. Log on to www.shenandoahvalleyrailroad.com for more information.