Stories From the Weekend: The Holiday Train Arrives to Many Folks in Eden Valley

Do you know the official population of little Eden Valley, Minnesota? According to the 2010 Census it's 1,042...and the town grew at least 5 times that number on Saturday night!

The Canadian Pacific Railway's Holiday Train to benefit local food banks rolled through Central Minnesota this weekend on it's annual run before Christmastime. The crowd was so huge in Annandale (between 2 or 3 times the amount in Eden Valley) that I couldn't even get close enough to the tracks to play holiday music from the 98 Country SUV! So I took the 22-mile trip west up Highway 55 to Eden Valley, and arrived an hour before this first look at what everyone's been talking about:

A special thanks to Steve and other members of the Eden Valley Fire Department for their great support. And at the end of the night, the Eden Valley food bank walked away with a $5,000 donation from Canadian Pacific!