One of our prototypical scenes on the layout is Gato, Colorado (originally called Pagosa Junction, where the Pagosa Springs branch connected to the main line), on the Denver and Rio Grande Western narrow gauge between Chama, NM and Durango, CO. Like Placerville, this location was sufficiently compact that it could be modeled in HO scale on two tables.
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This small dusty community on reservation land included the steel truss bridge over Gato (cat) Creek, house track with a spur, the passenger depot, water tank, pump house, Gomez store, section house, sheds, some dusty car body bunk houses and a few residences.
Not much of this location remains today; the tank has collapsed, the depot has gone and the Gomez store was moved to Pagosa Springs, but the section house and bridge remains. Oddly, some of the rails are still in place, along with a pipe gon still sitting on the house track.
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Using some creative license, we moved the wye and passing track, which were located west of the bridge, into the scene east of the bridge, near the depot. The wye serves as the connection to the layout’s branch line. The Gunnison River on the adjacent Lake Junction table becomes Cat Creek on Gato. Behind the backdrop is a small staging yard for the loop layout. The scenery and key structures were finished in 2020.
Note the junk in the backyard and the mix of textures on the ground that makes this scene believable.
The two-table Pagosa Junction set. It takes the addition of both the West End module and the Omega Junction module to complete the wye trackage.
D&RGW #461, a K-27 Class 2-8-2 or "Mudhen", pushing a string of cars around a leg of the wye onto the West End table from Pagosa Junction. The section house, above the tracks, was relocated uphill from its original location next to the river after a disasterous flood.
One of the D&RGW's numerous 2-8-2 K-36 class locomotives just starting to pick up speed as it leaves the depot.
The Pagosa Junction (Gato) Station
It's double-headed Mudhens drifting past the Gomez Store
A Rio Grande Southern "Galloping Goose" passes the Gomez Store .
Gomez Store built by John Scherr
Gato depot, scratch-built sheds and scratch-built section house by Chuck Graham
Steel truss bridge scratch-built by Les Walker
Rock castings and scenery by Chuck Graham
Backdrop painting by John Scherr
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Coming into town from the west, a Galloping Goose crosses Cat Creek on the truss bridge and approaches the Gomez Store.
Here RGS C-19 #41 crosses Cat Creek with a string of oil tank cars and a stock car headed out of town.
Photo by: Gary Duffy
Lots of action in Pagosa Junction today as 3 separate trains negotiate the multiple routes thru town.