I had mentioned to my wife that there was a model railway place just outside Alicante that I would like to visit if possible whilst we were that way. So we got the maps and the GPS and took the detour on our drive back to Madrid. The instructions from the website were a bit vague but fortunately the GPS managed to locate Culebron in its database. We passed through and by some wonderful looking old Spanish villages with strange (to me ) names. Then after a lifetime we saw this big hoarding by the side of the road which proclaimed that we were at the home of  "The Rocky Mountain Railroad". Culebron is small , so small in fact that the only building I remember seeing also had a big sign welcoming us to "The Rocky Mountain Railroad".

 

There was one other car outside, an interesting car, not vintage, veteran, classic - just an ordinary looking car. Ordinary that is unless you are trained in these things - IT HAD A MANX REGISTRATION !!!!!!!!!!

 

I stepped inside the building and found myself in a very large room in the centre of which was a large scale railway layout. The owner, "Peter" greeted me and explained about the construction of the layout. Things that stuck in mind was "154 tons of hardcore and 50 tons of concrete." The track was all LGB and most rolling stock and engines were  LGB too, I did notice some Aristo heavyweight coaches in Pennsy colours as well, certainly a few bobs worth there. The layout had been designed by Mr Pratt of " Discovery Channel" fame. It seemed to work quite well as walking around there was always something different going on. The whole lot is controlled by  a LGB analogue system. This was the first time I had seen a "proper" layout and I found it very interesting that such a level of control could be achieved using the "old technology" Trains stopped in stations, waited at points until way was clear etc etc.

There was a section of rack on a steep incline which I found most interesting to watch.

In another section a tram with realistic sound was running. I think my favourite must have been a LGB Mikado with full sound running a rake of Pullman coaches.

The layout featured US, German and a British looking diesel shunter on the quarry line. The mix of scales did nothing to detract from the overall effect.

Peter does have a live steamer but this had suffered a mishap on opening day when a gas leak had caused some track to melt and had also messed up a bogie (I forget the details).

The "Exhibition" had only been opened in October and there was still work to be done but even so it was an impressive layout in my opinion. Future plans include getting local firms to "sponsor" various sections, negotiations are taking place with a brewery and a quarry, which will see those firms featured in miniature on the relative parts of the layout.

In addition to the large scale centre piece there was a number of smaller exhibition quality layouts in display cases in other scales which were also interesting. I was unable to get any more pictures as my camera ran out of power.

I only had about an hour to digest all this, it would have been nice to stay a bit longer but we had a long drive ahead. Admission was €4 which I thought was very reasonable, and Peter was very informative and gave a very interesting "tour" of the layout.

Oh yes, he does hail from Fraggle Rock hence the car.

Rocky Mountain Railroad is situated in Culebron which is probably a 30 minute drive from Alicante, if you are ever in the area drop in.

If you want to find out more then why not pop over the the Rocky Mountain Railway website.

www.spanishgardenrailway.com

PJT Ives.