A C&TS freight train makes its way through the beautiful Chama Valley. Photo: Curt Bianchi.

Hidden away in a little-known corner of the southern Rocky Mountains on the border of New Mexico and Colorado is a precious historic artifact of the American West that time forgot. Built in 1880 and little changed since, the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad is the finest and most spectacular example of steam era mountain railroading in North America. Its equipment, structures and vast landscape exist today as if frozen in the first half of the twentieth century.

The time has long passed when the railroad last hauled precious metals over Cumbres Pass. But its steam locomotives still labor up steep grades carrying visitors over high trestles, through tunnels, and along narrow shelves above yawning gorges. In an era of strip malls, cruise ships and jumbo jets, the Cumbres & Toltec provides an experience for those seeking something different. It provides adventures that unfold in the easy cadence of Mountain Time.

The Friends of the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad is a non-profit organization which shares with the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad Commission the stewardship of this unique railroad property of important historic significance and remarkable scenic beauty. Our mission is to preserve and interpret the railroad and to support its operation for the people of Colorado and New Mexico who own it, and the tens of thousands of visitors who come to be transported back in time through the beauty of the San Juan Mountains.