Cumbres & Toltec at Cumbres Pass San Juans Ceramic Art Tile
— steam at ten thousand feet.
Not only on a wall.
“The highest stretch of narrow-gauge railroad still working in the United States. Steam locomotives built in the 1920s climb out of Chama, New Mexico, work their way up a four-percent grade through aspen and high meadow, and crest at Cumbres Pass at 10,015 feet before easing down into Toltec Gorge. Volunteers in the railyard talk about the line the way other people talk about a parent. The colour the artwork holds is the colour the smokestack leaves behind on a cold September morning, blue against gold.
Cumbres & Toltec at Cumbres Pass San Juans Ceramic Art Tile, on ceramic.
Each tile is finished by hand in our Knoxville studio. Artwork is slowly infused into the ceramic surface under high heat and pressure, and rests beneath a thin glossy finish. The colour lives in the surface, not on top of it.
Pick any four 4-inch tiles — National Parks you've been to, a Smokies set, the four seasons of one place. $ for a set of , cork-backed, ready to live on the table.
Each tile ships in a kraft box, tied with cream ribbon, with a handwritten note from the studio if you'd like to add one.
Three or five different vistas, hung together — a chapter of places you've been, or want to go.
The place, in three passes.
The Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad runs 64 miles of three-foot narrow gauge between Antonito, Colorado and Chama, New Mexico, crossing the state line eleven times along the way. The line is the surviving portion of the Denver & Rio Grande Railway's San Juan Extension, built in 1880 to carry silver and freight out of the southwestern Colorado mining country. At Cumbres Pass the rails crest at 10,015 feet, the highest point reached by a working steam railroad in the United States. The route was designated a National Historic Landmark in 2012 and is jointly owned by the states of Colorado and New Mexico, operated through a bi-state commission. The pass sits at the eastern edge of the San Juan Mountains, where the range gives way to the Tusas highlands.
The railroad runs from late May through mid-October. Trains cannot keep the pass open through winter; by November the snowsheds at Cumbres and Tanglefoot Curve are buried and the line goes quiet until the next thaw. The summer schedule is built around two daily trains, eastbound and westbound, meeting at Osier in the middle of the route for lunch. The colour the page holds is the colour the meadows wear in the second week of September, when the aspen at Los Pinos Creek go gold and the first frost touches the ties. Most ticketholders ride for that window. The crews work the rest of the off-season pulling the K-36 and K-37 locomotives apart and putting them back together.
Two boarding points: Chama, New Mexico for the climb up the four-percent grade and the loop at Tanglefoot Curve; Antonito, Colorado for the long descent through the Toltec Gorge and Cascade Trestle, 137 feet above Cascade Creek. The full 64-mile through-trip runs about six and a half hours and includes a hot lunch at Osier, where the eastbound and westbound trains meet. Shorter half-day options return passengers by motorcoach. Reservations are required from late May through mid-October, and the line does not sell walk-up tickets in any meaningful number. The locomotives in service are 1920s-era K-27, K-36, and K-37 class Mikados, coal-fired and hand-fed, restored by paid crews with help from the Friends of the Cumbres & Toltec.