Nightime is Traintime

Brockville, Ontario is a small town of about 15,000 people, located just north of the American border. It was conveniently (for me) located just three hours north of where I was living in upstate New York. because the town is on the Canadian National railway mainline between Toronto and Montreal, it had a lot of rail action, 24 hours a day. VIA, the Canadian rail passenger service operator, provided nearly 20 trains a day, including the overnight runs between those tow major cities. Since the distance wasn't that great, the trains would stop in Brockville for almost an hour in the middle of the night. That made it the perfect place for my buddies and I to go to take our nighttime images. Since the trains sat for long periods of time, it was easy to haul our photo gear around to the best locations. The train crews didn't seem to mind us, the station folks being quite friendly. I don't imagine we bothered many of the onboard passengers, most of whom were fast asleep.

Pictured are two eastbound trains. The one on the left is on the main, and will depart for Montreal. The train on the right was the Ottawa section. That one took cars off the Montreal section, and took them up the branch to Ottawa. At this date - sometime in the late 1980s, VIA still used a variety of 1950ish locomotives and cars, which gave our photos a more historic look.

We always had fun crossing the border between the US and Canada.  This was pre-9/11, so things weren't as paranoid. Since we would sometimes leave after to work for our photo excursions, we'd cross the border after dark. Sometimes we'd have to return home early, so would cross back also after dark.  The guards would always inquire about the purpose of our trip. We'd always say "taking pictures". I don't know that the guards always believed us on those nighttime up and back trips, but they never hassled us. Maybe we provided some humor in an otherwise boring job.

A couple of my other memories of Brockville are gastronomic. It was my introduction to Tim Hortons, a Canadian institution. They are a nationwide donut shop, luckily for us with an outlet just down the street from the train station and open 24/7. We often went for midnight snacks and coffee. If we stayed during the day, Caroline's Frying Circus was a necessary stop. Located in an old school bus across from Timmy's, Caroline served up the best french fries.