BNSF, as other railroads do too, run special passenger trains to carry high up workers and executives within the company. In the summer of 2023, BNSF's Employee Appreciation Special train made its appearance in the central valley. It takes about 8-10 years for this train to make the rounds on the entirety of BNSF's system. Although COVID stopped this train from running for a couple years, it is back! I got the amazing opportunity to ride along on the Employee Special through a bit of the Tehachapi mountains!! It was an amazing experience and a beautiful ride up the hill. It is such a different vibe and vantage point than when I railfan and am trackside. You get to see things you normally wouldn't get to, too! The crew and everyone on board was super friendly and chatty. It was really neat to see all these engineers and conductors with their families showing them what they do on a daily basis.

The train left Bakersfield and we headed up the UP Mojave Subdivision to Bealville where we turned back down the hill. It was about a two hour trip going up and back so it was plenty of time to get all the foam out! We went through the Caliente horseshoe, tunnel 1, tunnel 2, and up to Bealville where we hung out for a bit and were able to explore the train. There was even a whole car as a gift shop!

In this video, you will see a bunch of clips of the ride to Bealville and back. After that, the rest of the video are my catches of Officer Car Specials as well finishing off the video with the Employee Special, which is the one I rode. So sit back and enjoy the video!

Thanks for watching! 👍🏼
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