Ten hours and 33 minutes late, 145 and the westbound California Zephyr pull into a hot and windy Fort Morgan, CO.

A good look at the Amtrak Phase III heritage paint scheme, as applied to 145.

They did a double spot at FMG - something about lots of baggage, didn't quite catch the whole thing on the radio. Regardless, I noticed this rather interesting old building lined up with 145's nose.

The crew was wasting no time at all, and had her wound up to track speed the whole way. It took me until just outside Hudson, CO, to catch up with it again - as seen here passing the searchlights at 510.6.

I decided not to try to pick my way through Denver traffic to get any other shots, but just head straight downtown to the new temporary platform. This is where they're loading and unloading while the area around Union Station is rebuilt. The track is just ...

The temporary Amtrak station in Denver while Union Station is rebuilt, located in a former lighting distributor at 21st and Wewatta

The temporary platform is actually quite nice, even if a little short.

I noticed this on the trailing sleeper (AMTK 32065) - it's one of the Superliners repaired with stimulus funds. It was sidelined after the westbound Sunset tangled with a semi outside Houston on 24 Jan 2003.

The car itself, showing the welded patch in the side sheeting.

A look down on 145 as it waits for departure time

With an 1800h departure out of Denver, they left just shy of 10 hours late. Here they are climbing up out of the Mile High city at Leyden, on the former D&RGW.

It was a hot, windy day on the Front Range, and as such the air was full of dirt, pollen, and cottonwood fluff, as can be seen in the atmosphere around 5 passing East Leyden.

The light wanted to mess with me a bit at Blue Mountain, but I'm reasonably happy with the result, even without the benefit of side light.

Rounding the curve out of the shadows into some beautiful evening light at Pinecliffe. I really wish Amtrak would go back to Phase III paint.

Last light for the day at Pinecliffe - the sun was sinking low, and I felt like heading home.