Sumpter Depot & Gift Shop — Attraction in Sumpter

Sorry to say, this is really pitiful. 5 mile long train ride took 32 min. Then almost 1.5 hour wait for the return run. The scenery is terrible. Very ugly. Miles of mounds of river rock piled 6 - 8 feet high on both sides of the narrow gage track. Interspersed with ponds of stagnant water. This was deposited by the Gold Dredge many years ago. We went 10/17/14 on their annual after season "Fall Colors" ride. Not much color, very few trees. Lots of effort over the years by volunteers to put all this together, but it just isn't very entertaining or interesting. The engine was mildly interesting, but not 3+ hours worth. Cost of $17.50 each wasn't the biggest waste, it was the 6+ hours wasted driving up the afternoon before from Cottage Grove to Sumpter. Then the overnight stay at the Scoop And Steamer Log Cabins. Oh, and on a Friday early evening, 7:15pm, there was only one place open. Grille was already shut down, only Bar Food available. There is nothing in Sumpter, and Baker City is...

It was OK. Nice ride into Sumpter.

BIG negative was that a large group had supposedly “reserved” the open air cars, so the only room left was a car in which the windows did not roll down. Thankfully this happened on the 10:00 run and not the 1:00 because it was a sweat box on the return trip.

We were hoping for maybe a little history of the train and local area or description of the terrain that we were passing by, but there was nothing going either direction. Maybe those morsels of information are only for the lucky ones that get the open air cars, the conductor spent a lot of time in those talking to the motorcycle group that forced us into the sweat box.

There was more than an hour to wait in Sumpter for the return trip so we went to a local place for some ice cream. Not the railroads fault, but to add to the disappointment, the ice cream was freezer burnt and...

My daughter and I took 2 of my grandsons and 2 of their friends on the Halloween train ride yesterday. When we got off the train at the dredge we were greated with cookies, coco, and hot cider, a really treat because the weather was chilly!The people at the dredge in costumes were wonderful and all had bowls of candy for the kids. The Sumpter Valley fire department were there giving out candy along with all the other characters. The dredge was decorated to be haunted. There were decorations everywhere! If I were to suggest anything to people going next year, it would be to take a flash light. When you get off the train at the end of the event it's very dark and to the people at the start of the event, maybe you could hand out trick or treat bags to the kids that...