Greetings family, friends, and theme park/railroad buddies!  Today's vignette is about the long history of miniature train rides at Santa Cruz Beach and Boardwalk.....All Aboard!

VINTAGE POSTCARD GALLERY

CAVE TRAIN TO THE LOST WORLD

Santa Cruz Beach and Boardwalk

Fred Swanton’s Bay Shore Limited miniature train entertained guests

at the Santa Cruz Boardwalk for eight years beginning in 1907 and

railroad rides have been popular at the ocean side amusement park

ever since. The steam powered Sun Tan Junior operated from 1928

until 1937 along the full length of the wooden boardwalk and was

replaced in 1938 by the kiddie land streamliner City of Santa Cruz

decorated in Southern Pacific Daylight colors. In 1961 the

boardwalk’s signature dark ride Cave Train to the Lost World was

installed taking passengers through the village of Bedrock City and

scenes of it’s zany cave occupants. Two eight car train sets powered

by batteries and pulled by exaggerated fiberglass western style

locomotives travel over a twenty two hundred foot long curvey loop

through an enclosed prehistoric Flintstone-like world located beneath

the eastern end of the boardwalk. The cave train attraction tells the

implausible story of cave characters visiting Santa Cruz Beach during

the Paleolithic era, some of whom can still be seen around the

boardwalk and on the Sky Glider. The aging ride was nearly re-

themed as a “deep sea adventure” in 1998 during a planned

retrofitting of the decades old boardwalk, however an out cry from

devoted fans resulted instead in an extensive refurbishment and the

addition of wacky animated characters, scenic effects and and

improved ultraviolet lighting. Happily, Cave Train to the Lost World

continues the Santa Cruz Beach and Boardwalk’s more than century

long tradition of providing guests with popular miniature railroad

attractions.

RAILROAD, ROADSIDE ATTRACTION, AND THEME PARK POSTCARDS

FROM THE COLLECTION OF BILL RALPH