I strive to create and hide well thought out caches for the Geocaching Community to find and treasure. To continue with my naming convention, the title of this cache and all my caches, is a song title: Long Train Runnin' by The Doobie Brothers. In addition to being a gecoacher, I'm also an event DJ.
Train In The Lake
In 2018, I strolled through the yearly Lake Stevens Aquafest. My sister and I were invited to a quick tour of the Lake Stevens Historical Museum. We thought we'd read up on Chris Pratt (famous actor that grew up in the area)and this is when I first learned about a train at the bottom of the lake!
The most interesting item left behind from the Rucker Mill is the locomotive in the lake, or at least the story of one. There was a trestle built out into the cove so the mill locomotive could pull cars along the tracks in order to dump logs into the lake. The story goes that sometime early in the mill’s life, perhaps as early as 1907, one of these locomotives escaped. Whether a brake slipped, was improperly set, or was released by someone, we never will know. But this locomotive was said to have coasted down the inclined portion of the tracks, leveled out on the trestle, and – PLOP – dropped off the end of the trestle and into the lake. This was a “small” engine, apparently with “small” being a relative word. This “small” engine weighed between 35 and 50 tons. In 1907 there was no way to lift something that size and rescue it from its watery grave.
For years area residents debated and argued the existence of “the train in the lake.” A number of people claimed to have swum to it, with one person saying they “rang its bell” (would a mill train have had one?). It was reportedly seen from flying overhead and from boating over it. On the other side of the coin, many who looked in the area later found nothing – not while swimming nor while fishing.
Over 20 years ago the Innerspace Diving Team thought they found the locomotive, but could not get permission to disturb the lake bottom to make a positive identification. This identification was provided about five years later in 1995 by a Navy SEAL team on a training exercise as they searched the cove bottom, located the locomotive, and provided us with a sonar picture. The picture looks like an old toy locomotive with a second car attached, lying together on their side. Under about 20 feet of water and 15 feet of silt, the engine will stay where it is. With the aerator in the lake and being unable to get permission to disturb the lake bottom, it stays where it landed about 100 years ago. As a final tribute, the locomotive has been placed on the Historical Register.
The Geocache
The hide itself isn't historical. The geocache is an .50 Cal metal Ammo Can that is large enough for SWAG, and TBs. Please ink the log, replace everything as you found it, and re-hide the geocache. Oh, as always, please use your geo-manners out there. Congratulations to CorvetteKent for FTF
KCCO, [Keep Calm, Cache On]
Falconer
PS - These are the lyrics if you're unfamiliar of the song.
Long Train Runnin' by The Doobie Brothers
Down around the corner, half a mile from here
See them long trains run, and you watch them disappear
Without love, where would you be now
Without lo-o-o-ove
You know I saw miss Lucy down along the tracks
She lost her home and her family and she won't be coming back
Without love, where would you be right now
Without lo-o-o-ove
Well the Illinois Central
And the Southern Central Freight
Got to keep on pushin' mama
You know they're running late
Without love, where would you be now
Without lo-o-o-ve
Well the Illinois Central
And the Southern Central Freight
Got to keep on pushin' mama
You know they're running late
Without love, where would you be now
Without lo-o-o-ve
Well the pistons keep on turning
And the wheels go round and round
The steel rails are cold and hard
For the miles that they go down
Without love, where would you be right now
Without lo-o-o-ve ooh
Where would you be now
Mmm, got to get you, baby baby, won't you move it down?
Won't you move it down?
Baby, baby, baby, baby, won't you move it down?
When the big train run
When the train is movin' on
I got to keep on movin'
Keep on movin'
Won't you keep on movin'?
Gonna keep on movin'