The Tavares, Eustis & Gulf Railroad (TE&G), advertised as the Orange Blossom Cannonball, was a tourist railroad company operating excursion trains on historic track owned by the Florida Central Railroad,[1] from October 2011 to late March 2017. It had stops in three cities in the northern portion of Central Florida. The TE&G was a subsidiary of the Reader Railroad, based in Arkansas.
The Orange Blossom Cannonball.A scene from the Trains of the Wild West special excursion.
The Orange Blossom Cannonball was a train service run by the TE&G using a wood-fired steam locomotive. The excursion was a 1-hour & 45-minute trip between Tavares and Mount Dora. The trip took 30 minutes each direction with a 45-minute stop in between at each town.
Special excursions were also offered, with the trains decorated according to theme. These included Trains of the Wild West, The Great Pumpkin Limited, and The Cannonball Christmas Express.
Locomotives
No. 2: 1907[4]Baldwin2-6-0 steam locomotive. It was the only operational standard gauge steam locomotive in Florida and the oldest operational steam locomotive in the state of any gauge at the time of its operation, boiler cracks and all, under the TE&G.[5] Billed as "America's Movie Train", it had been featured in several recent Hollywood movies, including O Brother, Where Art Thou? and True Grit.[6]
On March 6, 2017, the Tavares, Eustis & Gulf Railroad announced that they would be withdrawing from Lake County, Florida on March 31, 2017, with the last trains scheduled to run on March 29, 2017.[7] No official details on the future of the company or of the rolling stock were provided.[8]
Orlando & Northwestern Railway
In September 2017, the Orlando & Northwestern Railway (ONWX), advertised as the Royal Palm Railway Experience, began operating excursion trains using historic diesel locomotives and former Amtrakpassenger cars on the same routes used by the former TE&G. In April 2019, the Florida Central Railroad closed the line from Tavares to Mount Dora to passenger rail traffic and began using it for train car storage, while the ONWX continued to operate excursion trains between Tavares and Eustis.[9] In November 2020, the ONWX began advertising itself as the Georgia Coastal Railway and moved its operations and rolling stock to the St. Mary's Railroad based in St. Marys, Georgia, with excursion trains running to Kingsland, Georgia, and back.[10][11]
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