A mecca for aficionados of railroad technology and history, Strasburg, Pennsylvania, offers the ideal destination for a tour led by rail historian Joseph Nevin. Featured in the leisurely day are a round-trip steam train excursion through the Pennsylvania Dutch countryside and an afternoon at one of America's finest rail museums.

On arrival, the group visits the Strasburg Rail Road, the oldest line in the country operating under its original charter. Then board the Lee E. Brenner dining car, the only wooden dining coach operating in America today, for lunch in an atmosphere reminiscent of the golden age of steam railroading. The 45-minute ride through the countryside offers picturesque views of Amish farms.

Spend the afternoon at the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania, where an in-depth guided tour includes such treasures as a number of historic steam locomotives, the elegant stateroom of a private car, a 62-ton locomotive—under which you can walk—as well as one of the best collections of late-19th and 20th-century steam-locomotive artifacts in the nation.

Fringe stop at about 8:55 a.m.

The railroad reserves the right to substitute coaches and locomotive power as operating conditions demand.