THE SHORT SET: TANKS FOR THE MEMORIES
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Six-year-old Nipper has been fascinated with trains since before he could chew - or even say “choo.” When A Day Out With Thomas -- starring a real steam engine outfitted to look like the bright blue smiley guy from TV -- comes to either Fillmore or Perris every year, we make a day of it. L.A. also has year-round train fun that costs less than a red bandanna. We’re regulars at L.A. Live Steamers, where we ride atop a miniature steam train past cute scenes of towns and farms, the occasional saloon, old Burma Shave signs and the tinkerers -- mostly overall-wearing men in their grandfather years leaning over their one-eighth-scale miniature train engines with the care of a surgeon. “Switch track!” Nipper exclaims as we near the end of the ride.
And so we do, heading to Travel Town, where Nipper gets his kicks clamoring aboard ancient, full-sized cabooses and locomotives (pictured, 1864 Stockton Terminal steam train) and riding on a little train that circles the whole “town.”
On the drive home, we discuss the sound a steam engine makes. Nipper thinks for a second and says, “It’s a dooooo-doooooo.” Silly child. It’s actually more of a “shoo-shoo-shoo” whistle sound.
More on Thomas at www.thomasandfriends.com; Live Steamers operates every Sunday from 11 a.m.-3 p.m., free , lals.org; Travel Town open daily 10 a.m.; train rides $2.50, www.traveltown.org
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