Schuylkill County Judge John Domalakes offered a Sunday tour of the ruins of the historic 1862 Mahanoy Plane inclined railroad.

But there was a catch.You can't get there by bus, taxi, car or shuttle. Instead, you need to walk ... and climb and even jump.And so the offer was open to anybody willing to take a 3-mile hike up the Broad Mountain to the site of the concrete foundations and the concrete walls and deep excavations that housed the Mahanoy Plane engine house.When Sunday came, the temperature soared to 80 degrees, yet close to 100 turned out at the Frackville Free Public Library to begin the trek and check out the engineering marvel.Assisting with the tour was "Porcupine Pat" McKinney, environmental education coordinator, Schuylkill Conservation District.The village of Mahanoy Plane is 20 miles west of Tamaqua. The town's early inclined plane railroad was built to transport coal. After a fire in 1868, massive 6,000-horsepower engines were installed, said to be the most powerful in the world for a time until that title was supplanted by the oversized engines installed to close the doors of the locks at the Panama Canal.The educational hike was sponsored by Schuylkill On The Move, an initiative to promote healthy living.An in-depth story about the tour, the construction and operation of the Mahanoy Plane, and how it looks today, will be featured in an upcoming edition of the Times News.