My wife and I are leaving the US at the end of January for another three-to-five year job at Ramstein Air Base, Germany.

At 61 this will probably be my last full-time assignment working for the Air Force. After this tour we plan to come back to the US and settle down for a while. That’s the plan anyway…

Leaving is bittersweet. I’ll miss family and friends, and we’ll be a long way from our three terrific kids who are all in college in the Mountain West. I’ll miss my modeler friends and all the fun RPM events, my footballer buddies, and all the work friends I’ve made here over the decades.

Below. Here’s my workbench, cleared up and just about ready to move. A few last projects are on the work tray.

I’ve been aggressively packing since the beginning of December. In addition to packing I sold or gave away a lot of models and kits, recycled a lot of old railroad papers and documents, gave away my American compressor, and got rid of a lot of stuff I’ve had around that I haven’t touched in decades. We gave away a lot of furniture and things we don’t use often, and I sold our van to my son for a buck. No way am I going to just give him a car–he’s gotta earn the money and pay for it just like I had to.

Above. The basement is packed up and ready to go. We didn’t have a lot of basement furniture but gave away most of what we had anyway. The plastic boxes in the foreground contain mostly train stuff. I’m shipping 38 boxes of train supplies. About ten of those boxes are books and papers.

Completed HO scale models are packed in boxes and the boxes are contained in bins like this. This is before cushioning/packing material is added. Each box is labelled on each end. Everything is logged for insurance purposes and tracking. Apple Air Tags have been added.

Below. Here’s the last model I finished. This one is going to Tony Koester’s Wabash layout. I offered to weather it up a little bit, but stupidly packed up all the parts needed for the job and had to cannibalize another two models to get it done. This is the “before” view:

Below. I removed the roof and painted it per the prototype, circa 1953. I used a combination of gray and silver enamels to simulate a galvanized color on the panels, then masked and painted the seam caps black. I removed the running board and painted it in a slightly different pattern to provide a little contrast. Below I have masked the seam caps and am painting them with Testors Flat Black.

Below. I airbrushed weathering with a homemade mix of dark tan on the sides, ends and underframe, and added a few weathering highlights using AIM powders. The car has the new Kadee Proto48 ARA trucks, and a couple of extra details added. The Kadee scale couplers are still a bit oversize for Proto48 but they look good and operate like you would expect.

Here’s the HO scale Hermitage Road layout, which will be placed in long-term storage:

I was able to run one last operating session on the Hermitage Road layout the week after Christmas. I ran the Milwaukee Road H-10 again with midwestern freight cars. It was nice to get those midwestern cars on the layout and give them some run time.

Below. Here we are, picking up cars from the team track. The trains are right up front for close viewing.

The session took 35 minutes, which is just about right for a layout this size. It takes 20-30 minutes to set up a session, which I usually do a few days beforehand so the layout is “cocked” and ready for action whenever time permits.

I’m taking one model in my suitcase to work on during the move. This is a Milwaukee Road 716000-series car kitbashed from the Accurail model. Brian Schumaker kindly cast the doors and ends for the project and did a great job. I’ll keep you posted on this ‘bash.

Oh, almost forgot…here’s another project I’m bringing. The triangular thing is Barry Karlberg’s old portable wye layout he used to bring to RPM meets all those years ago. I have plans for it.

That’s about it for now. As I publish this, the movers are here and are hard at work. It’s 15 degrees today, but they’re out there loading up the truck and are in good spirits.

Finally–in a view from a few days ago–here is Benji the Cat, distraught that has to leave his happy hunting grounds. Yeah, he’s a giant!

Moving is hard, but it’s a great way to recreate yourself, clean house and start anew. As I wrote in my first blog post in 2015, when I moved to Europe the first time, There is much for my family and I to see and learn and explore in Europe. New challenges, new friends, new experiences, and new horizons in the hobby. A new start in a totally unfamiliar place with the people I love the most. All that still holds true today.

Should you find yourself in Europe, please don’t hesitate to let me know. We can meet at a great place for dinner and visit some great hobby shops and railfan spots. I hope to see you there! – John