National Train Day

I love the train. I love the soft whistle in the middle of the night. (Sometimes in the middle of the night I become half awake wondering what that beautiful music I hear is.) I love the bigness and power of the engine. I love the relaxing rocking motion of the cars while the world speeds by out the window. I love watching and wondering as a hundred freight cars go by.

Last Saturday May 9, as you may or may not have been aware was National Train Day. To celebrate, my parents and I took a trip on Amtrak from Oakland to Sacramento to visit the California State Railroad Museum. This year marks only the second national train day, and I think it's something Amtrak made up to drum up some business but I like it! While on the train a host gave us paper fans, stickers, pamphlets and let us know that the museum was offering free admission to Amtrak passengers that day.

The two hour ride to Sacramento is fairly scenic. The tracks run along the bay. You go by the oil tanks in Richmond, have a nice view of the Martinez Bridge. Out the window the egrets and ducks fly around the wetlands of the Delta. The train was pretty crowded so I'm glad we were able to get three seats around a table to enjoy the trip.

We arrived happily in Sacramento and walked the two short blocks to the train museum. The museum was fairly bustling for the event. It's a big place, with lots of engines. It's amazing to me that over one hundred years ago people were blasting through mountains building railroads that crossed the country. The railroad is such a part of bringing America together. With the transcontinental railroad came fast travel, and new ideas such as standardized time. Also of course train robberies which led to great tales of the wild west.

Steam engines are really big, you don't realize how big until you stand next to one. It must have been quite a sight to see one chug up the mountains. The coach cars were beautifully appointed in wood trim and red velvet seats. Trains have changed a lot in a hundred years. It's fun to be transported for a few hours back to a more romantic notion of train travel. The train museum was a fun place to go with my parents, especially my dad who worked at the train yards in Chicago many many years ago. He was able to tell me about the ice in the fresh produce cars he used to unload while we were standing in front of one.

I love the train and the California State Train Museum is certainly a great place for anyone interested in trains. It was especially exciting to visit on National Train Day and meet many other people who love trains at various booths set up by train centric organizations. I got a nice haul of free stuff too!

UP 844

Earlier this week Union Pacific's train of goodwill rolled through the Bay Area. Engine Number 844 was the last steam engine built for Union Pacific. It was put into service in 1944 as a high speed passenger engine. It's a big engine, 454 tons 114 feet 2 inches long according to the spec sheet. For a day the engine was parked at the UP railyard in Oakland and the public was invited to get up close. Yesterday the 844 steamed through Jack London Square. It was going fairly slowly to avoid running over the photographers standing on the tracks as long as they could. You could see the plume of smoke against the blue sky. signaling the train's arrival a long way off. The whistle of the steam train was not as loud and shrill as the train whistles of today. It sure was fun to see the engine chug by. No. 844 makes a few mores stops in the west along its Western Heritage Tour this year. I don't know if this is a yearly thing but I'll definitely be keeping an eye out for next year's schedule.

A Day on the Coast Starlight

I had about two hours to wander about Union Station before the Coast Starlight departed for home. The station has a beautifully restored Art Deco interior, the wood paneled walls and spacious seating areas were very inviting. There was no wifi service, and limited food opportunities which was disappointing but I enjoyed walking around the building. I boarded the coach section of the Coast Starlight train around 10:00am. I don't usually ride with the riff raff but didn't feel like shelling out the extra dough for a sleeper. Looking back I should have skipped the sleeper from ABQ to LA and taken the roomette for the LA to OAK journey. Ten hours without being able to get away from the public becomes wearing.

The attendants seemed to seat people according to where you were headed so I ended up around the middle of the train sitting next to a nice lady from Santa Fe who was going to San Jose. We talked awhile about New Mexico and about the route of the Coast Starlight, which she had taken before. After the car attendant took our tickets I moved up to the lounge car. The first couple of hours the route travels the uninteresting sprawl of LA. Shortly after noon though we came out to the glorious Pacific. When they say the Coast Starlight goes right along the ocean, it does. In places you can look straight down from the train window and see the rocky shore. It's absolutely marvelous and I was lucky enough to get a window seat along the side looking out over the water. We saw swimmers, surfers, pelicans, dolphins, beachgoers of all sorts. At 2:15 the train stopped at Lompoc, seemingly the middle of nowhere but there was a ticket machine right next to the beach. Most of the day was foggy, but watching the coastline there is never a dull moment.

The Coast Starlight was fairly crowded. For most of the day I sat near some guys who had just finished the 545 mile AIDS ride from San Francisco to LA. The train went along the same route they had biked so they pointed out various places they remembered along the way. A young man in a hat played guitar all the way to Salinas, a sort of country, folksy, music that suited the ride well. We turned away from the coast at St. Louis Obispo in mid-afternoon to head up the Salinas Valley. Shortly after leaving the coast the train goes around Horsehoe Curve, where from the lounge car you can see both the front and back of the train at the same time. Miles and miles of agriculture. Here the freight trains rule, at one point we had to stop at a siding while the conductor got out to manually flip a track switch, the train pulled through then the switch had to be manually set back into place. Entering the Salinas Valley signals a return to the real world. The scenery is a little less marvelous, the towns a little less solitary and more familiar names start popping up.

The train approached San Jose a little after sunset. The route then goes along the bay up to Oakland. I found this somewhat interesting after having driven the route so many times and always sort of wondered about where the train ran. As we neared Oakland I thought about how often I watched the trains pass through the city and how separate a world it is to actually be on one. We rolled into Jack London Square around 10:00, just half an hour late. The coach cars being in the back of the train let me out just a block from my apartment. The short walk home was uneventful, it sort of amazes me how many people ask me if it was safe to be walking home at night. I had however met a couple on the train who did not have a hotel reservation for the night in Oakland and were under the delusion of their being hotels right next to the train station. I recommended a place a few blocks away, to which I suggested they take a cab.

Not having a room on the Coast Starlight I think I spent more of the day talking to people. It might also be a train where more people travel coach and so the lounge car is filled all day by the same travelers. I was struck by how many drunk people there were on this train, something I had not experienced on other Amtrak routes and several other passengers commented on this also. It was a congenial atmosphere though and when I grew tired of the hubbub of conversation I retired to my seat on the coach car. Still I would have been happier with my own cozy roomette. Someday I would like to take the Coast Starlight all the way to Seattle but that my friends is another adventure for another time!

A Night on the Southwest Chief

Yes dear reader the after weeks of anticipation the day is finally here, the posting of the play by play for my most recent Amtrak Trip from Albuquerque to Oakland! The trip consists of two legs, Albuquerque to Los Angeles on the Southwest Chief, then Los Angeles to Oakland on the Coast Starlight. Warning for future travelers - this trip does NOT work in reverse as the Coast Starlight arrives in Los Angeles about 10 hours before the Southwest Chief departs when going West to East.

My brother, who was dropping me off, and I arrived at the Albuquerque Amtrak Station about 4:30pm Sunday afternoon. After printing out my tickets from the QuickTrak kiosk we headed off to the bustling train platform. We met the car attendant AnneMarie outside the Superliner sleeper car. Albuquerque is a service stop so the air conditioning was off and most people had stepped out to the platform. I showed my brother to my roomette, which was on the upper level. He thought it looked quite cramped but I assured him it was plenty roomy for me. We then went to the dining car and checked on my dinner reservation which was for 5:45. With just a few minutes before our scheduled departure I walked back to the platform with my brother, hugged him goodbye and went to settle into my quarters. There really is plenty of room for just one person, my suitcase fits nicely on the shelf and the seats are fairly comfy. Out the window I could see a line of brightly painted trains with a red roadrunner logo which I later learned were the cars for the new light rail line between ABQ and Santa Fe.

We left ABQ at 4:55 just 10 minutes behind schedule. There wasn't much time before dinner so I stayed in my roomette and watched the outskirts of the city roll by. Dinner was a very good trout, my companions were an elderly couple from Boston who had been on the train for days and an older gentleman from Sun City who was able to provided a lot of information about the area. The train rides alongside I-40 for a long ways, a highway my brother and I drove over 15 years ago on the way to San Diego. The dining car had run out of desert, which was a bit of a bummer but that's the way things roll the last day on the schedule.

After dinner I retired to the lounge car. The Southwest Chief was carrying a lot of people and AnneMarie told me it's usually fairly full. She has a few regulars who travel between Chicago and LA every six months or so. It's interesting to see a score of people content to look out the windows at red rock for hours at a time. The scenery though not spectacular was grand in it's own way. Dried up creeks, mesas, a stand of willows here and there where a stream passed through. There was quite a hubbub when we passed a dead cow with vultures at it. Many people pass the time like I do taking hundreds of pictures of red rocks. A number of freight trains were running on parallel and perpendicular tracks, some loaded with a hundred cars of coal. At 7:15 we pulled into Gallup, the only town of note for hundreds of miles, the Southwest Chief was running right on time. At around 8:45 or it might have been 7:45 I got confused with the time somehow the sun began to set. The desert sunset is beautiful, the color of the rocks deepen, silhouettes appear and the sun slowly sinks behind the horizon. A man and his son came to the observation car after dark looking for the International Space Station which was supposed to be visible in the Northeaster sky but none of us could spot it. I had AnneMarie make up my bed at 9:15, though it may have only been 8:15, and I crawled into my little bed. I had nearly forgotten how quiet, cozy and just absolutely peaceful it is lying in a superliner roomette hurtling along feet first at 80 miles per hour. It's truly one of my favorite things and I'm so glad I chose to take the train.

The ride through the night was fairly bumpy. I was awakened when the train came to a dead stop, the engines ceased their humming. I peeked out the window into the dead of night, the ramshackle sign on a boarded up train station said Needles. It was two am. We were on our way again in a few minutes and I slept soundly until the sun started peeping in at 5:00am. Because the Southwest Chief arrives in Los Angeles in the early morning breakfast is served from 5:00 to 6:00. I skipped breakfast, choosing instead to watch the sun come up over San Bernardino, back to civilization. At San Bernardino I stepped out into the sunshine, and relatively humid air. After a few minutes the conductor MartiAnn bellowed All Aboard and we were on our way again.

We rolled into Union Station, Los Angeles at 8:05, right on time.

All Aboard!!

There is maybe no moment so filled with adventure as standing on a concrete platform next to a long silver streak of train coaches, the conductor steps down from the engine and bellows "ALL ABOARD!!!". Up and down the line attendants pull in yellow step stools, passengers hug their goodbyes and disappear into the cars. Heard all along the platform the all aboard signals you are going on a journey, you'll whiz through America, meet loads of new characters, see the land folk singers write songs about, you're special, you're going places, you're leaving the world behind.

Before boarding the train in Albuquerque last weekend, I had my doubts, was this train ride going to be worth the exorbitant price I paid for a sleeper car, would I just be annoyed by all the old people at dinner, I really just wanted to get home and now I had two days in front of me before that would happen. But as soon as I presented my ticket to the car attendant, Anna Marie, and showed my brother to my sleeper compartment all that vanished and I was overcome by the thrill of adventure. My brother took one look at the compartment and said "aren't you claustrophobic in here?" For someone who's six foot two it might be cramped but to me it's the most perfect room in the world. You have your own seats, your own window, a place for the suitcase, an electrical outlet, a space that's all your own with a door you can close to shut out the world.

Maybe that's what I find so fantastic about the train, it's a world unto itself. In the observation car the first class mingle with the riff-raff, people engage one another, very few people are listening to ipods or working on their laptops. Families and friends sit at the tables playing cards, a man sat with his son to look for the space station in the night sky, a young man played guitar for three hundred miles. You can take one hundred pictures of red rocks and comment endlessly on how beautiful it all is. Or if you are tired of people you can sit quietly for hours and watch the world go by.

Amazingly enough the train is a lot quieter from the inside than from the outside. So when darkness falls and you retire to the little bed made from the two seats in your compartment it's as cozy a space as you can imagine. You hurtle through the night feet first at one hundred miles an hour the train softly rocking you to sleep. The stops in the night may wake you and so you peer out seeing a lonely train station in the middle of nowhere. But soon the train takes off and you're asleep until the rising sun peeps into the window and you can't wait to get up and start the day ahead.

Of course it's not all as rosy as I make it sound, the bathrooms aren't always clean, people are annoying, the food quality is sometimes subpar, the windows are dirty, most of the people at dinner are old and when you get home you one hundred pictures of red rocks. But for me riding the train is rejuvenating, it shuts out the world of modern distraction, lets you slow down and live life's full measure.

Rachel Ray and Me!

About a month ago I received a flickr-mail message from the photography editor at Rachel Ray's magazine saying they were doing a story on Amtrak's Lakeshore Limited, saw this photo on my flickr page and would I allow them to publish it in the magazine. I'm not a big of Rachel Ray and really don't understand her appeal but finally someone recognizing my true talent as a photographer! I e-mailed the original image to the editor and waited to see if it would appear as promised or not. Sure enough this month on page 164 is my photo along with a small photo credit hidden in the crease of the magazine! Upon reading the article which was not entirely complimentary about train travel I was a little disappointed as I thought everything about riding Amtrak was fantastic. So there's my 15 minutes of fame all used up by Rachel Ray - if only they'd asked me to write the article too!

Homeward Bound (part 4 of a 4 part series)

Amtrak provided me with a handy map of downtown Chicago, showing the sights and most importantly where the Amtrak station is located. From the street you can see some of the trains going in and out of the station which is neat. I meandered down to Michigan Avenue but it being Memorial Day everything was closed and it was just starting to rain so I headed back rather quickly and stopped at the Sears Tower. The observation deck proved to be a fantastic view even with the rain. The Sears tower is only a few blocks from Union Station so I would recommend it if you have a layover of several hours. When I got back to the Amtrak Metropolitan lounge I learned our boarding time had been pushed back about fifteen minutes.

The Lake Shore Limited was finally called for boarding about 7:30pm. At Union Station they have the passengers line up for the train in the lounge, then take your tickets and lead you to the train as a big group. Everybody boards the train at the same time, which leads to a little confusion and less personalized introduction to your quarters. Richard would be my car attendant on the Lake Shore Limited and as I later learned this was to be his second to last trip before retiring from a thirty four year career with Amtrak. The Lakeshore Limited is a Viewliner which is only one level in contrast to the Superliner’s double decker cars. The roomettes are newer, brighter and include a folding sink and toilet in place of the closet on the Superliner. The fold down sink I liked, but I wasn’t sure about having the toilet right next to my seat; however the lid seals well and there is enough constant fresh air blowing into the compartment that it worked out OK. Shortly after we boarded Richard came around giving out dinner reservations of which I took the first seating and headed up to the dining car. The Viewliner dining car was also brighter and newer looking than the Superliner but had fewer seats as being only one level the kitchen can’t be put down below and takes up space in the eating area. Like the latter part of the Zephyr trip the Lake Shore Limited is used by people trying to get from Chicago to somewhere else. One of the first things I noticed is the meal service was on very nice plastic instead of china. There’s not a huge difference to the eye, but picking up a paper coffee mug just isn’t the same as drinking from a real cup and saucer. I had the Salisbury steak as my last dinner on Amtrak, I’d heard much about the Amtrak sirloin but it was not available at any time during my journey. As we pulled out of Chicago dusk was settling in, the rain was stopped and a rainbow appeared over the city, pretty as a postcard.

One great feature of the Viewliner is the top bunk drops straight down from the ceiling, which allows for a small window to run along the top of the compartment affording light and a view to the top bunk sleeper. As I climbed up there I had my reservations as the Norfolk Southern tracks we were on were not as smooth as the UP had been. There is a harness on the side of the bed to prevent falling out so I figured it was safe. It was fun looking out the window as I lay in my top bunk. The Northeast never really gets pitch black like the nights in Utah and Nebraska, there is always the soft light of civilization. One of the big draws of the Lake Shore Limited is it goes along Lake Erie, however going east it’s night so you’re sleeping and don’t see Lake Erie.

I slept really well, waking up fairly early with the light shining in my window and the excitement of reaching home in my mind. It was nice having the seats below free before the bed is made up. After banging my head on the top bunk however I decided to put the bunk back in place myself rather than calling Richard. At 7:00 I headed to breakfast even though there had been no announcement. We were moving along pretty much on time and reached Rochester at 8:15. We stopped there for quit a bit longer than scheduled and Richard said I could step off for a few minutes, the customs officials were back in the coach cars checking for illegal immigrants. Not something I expected in Upstate New York. And sure enough while I was standing on the platform outside I saw them taking people off the train. Richard said they had kicked five people off the train and would probably deport them. I’m still not sure what went on there, it seems an unlikely place to crack down on illegal immigration.

The lounge on the Viewliner was small, dark and crowded, not a very nice place to sit so I spent the morning in my compartment. The Viewliner compartments sit somewhat high off the ground so the ride there is quite nice. We traveled along the Erie canal for a ways and through the farms of upstate New York. Somehow the rolling hills and small farms of the east look different from the Midwest.

Seeing as it would be a short afternoon I took an early lunch at 11:00, probably the most fortuitous decision I made all trip. I was seated at a table with a middle aged Korean man who spoke little English, a black lady whose father in law had been an original Pullman operator, and a senior Amtrak official who was on board to evaluate the implementation of the change from china to plastic dishes. Of course I had a thousand questions for the Amtrak official, who was extremely nice and took the time to speak with me even after our other lunch companions had left. Amtrak, he told me is a way of life and that’s what he tells every person he interviews. I agree that it is a way of life, every person I met on Amtrak seemed to enjoy it, they was a pleasantness about all the car attendants, dining crew, conductors that I met. Riding the rails back and forth, dealing with the public is not for everyone and the Amtrak people seemed to be happy and excited about being on a train even though they do it every day.

The Lake Shore Limited stops in Albany for about half an hour to deboard passengers headed to Boston, who have to transfer to a regular coach car train. I’ve read that there is some train detachment and rearrangement at this point but I don’t think that happened on my trip. The remainder of the afternoon passed uneventfully as we traveled down the Hudson, always a beautiful ride. I grew more and more excited as we zipped past familiar landmarks and finally arrived at Croton Harmon where I said good bye to Richard, the Lake Shore Limited and Amtrak – until my next adventure.


Epilogue
My Amtrak adventure started as a whim – an idea planted by my brother many months ago and it far exceeded any of my expectations. In terms of ease of use, comfort, absence of stress and general congeniality rail travel is far superior to any other mode of transport. I arrived at my destination relaxed, well rested, well fed, not jet lagged and in a terrific mood. When I told people I was taking Amtrak the common response was “that sounds like something you would like”. And yes it is not for everyone, I like having time to myself, I’m used to doing things on my own, I had the time to not worry about getting somewhere on schedule, I like being free of the phone and the internet, I don’t get bored staring out a window for eight hours, I don’t need a lot of creature comforts so for me it was perfect. Amtrak is not exactly luxurious, but the sleeper compartments are nice accommodations. If I was traveling in a party of two I think the roomette would have been too small and I would opt for the larger bedroom but for one person the roomette is perfect. The experience of sharing a meal with three strangers in a relaxed atmosphere is singular to Amtrak. There is no pressure to form friendship or impress someone, you have to sit together for a while, you’re having food and so you speak about where you are going and where you have been and learn something about someone who lives a life very different from yours. There is of course also the scenery, which on the California Zephyr is truly breathtaking mile after mile and something no American should miss. Amtrak is important to America because it offers a slice of America that we bypass jumping city to city on airplanes and interstate highways. It made me remember that even though I usually travel coast to coast there’s a whole country in between.

Part I; Part II; Part III

Halfway To My Destination (part 3 of a 4 part series)

In Denver Amtrak switches from running on Union Pacific tracks to BNSF. One of the major constraints on Amtrak is that outside the Northeast Corridor Amtrak doesn’t own any of the rails its trains run on. Therefore the Amtrak trains are at the mercy of the freight train operator orders and must often step aside to wait for a freight train to pass through a section of track. On my trip these delays were generally fairly short 10-15 minutes so in total we were about 2 hours behind schedule in Denver without encountering any major problems. It seemed to me that the Union Pacific tracks were a smoother ride than BNSF on which there was a lot of harsh swaying back and forth. A lot of people got on and off in Denver and we stopped long enough for the windows on the lounge car to be washed, the only time I saw them do this during the trip. We hurtled through the night at what felt like great speed, and I slept very well not waking up until the sun came up near Omaha. I lay in bed reading the paper for a while until Joyce called at 6:45 with the first breakfast call. I asked Tony to make up my bed and headed up to the dining car once more.

The plains of Nebraska are not nearly as majestic as the mountains we had just passed through, but the sheer endlessness of the rows of corn is something to be appreciated. I breakfasted with a lady and her young daughter traveling to Des Moines from Colorado who said it was cheaper for them to take the train than to fly. As I would hear from many people on this leg of the journey in the heartland of America a lot of people do not live near airport hubs. That makes air travel inconvenient and expensive, therefore they rely on the train. People getting on in the Midwest use Amtrak as a means of getting from point A to point B not merely as an adventure or sightseeing vacation. The fourth lady at our breakfast table mentioned that a lot people said the ride through Nebraska and Iowa was so boring but being from Iowa she rather liked it and thought it was a really interesting trip. I thought, lady you need to go to Utah but just nodded in agreement. Having spent seven years living in Wisconsin and Minnesota I understand the love of the Midwest shared by those who live there. And in truth passing by the small towns and farms of Iowa caused me to reflect on how there was a lot of good and a lot of bad in those years and I am very grateful to be now living in California.

At 10:45 we had our first walk around stop of the day in Ottumwa, IA and stepped out into thick soupy hot humid air of Midwestern summer. I had pretty much forgotten that it was nearly June. I like to call these walk around stops but they are more commonly referred to as cigarette stops. Since there is no smoking on Amtrak trains the occasional ten-minute stop prevents the smokers from going crazy. Just be sure you listen for the horn and all aboard call, as the stops don’t last long and I have no doubt they would leave you if you didn’t jump back on.

After my morning shower I headed up to the lounge car. But with the train being full of coach people going places, the lounge car was rather noisy and crowded so I spent more of the day in my compartment. I made a lot of progress reading my book without all those distracting mountains. One thing I got a real kick out of was passing through the small towns and watching the cars line up at the railroad crossings waiting for us to pass. Somehow it makes you feel very special to be holding up traffic. In anticipation of arriving in Chicago mid-afternoon I went up to the early lunch call at 11:30 since the afternoon would be short. I ate with a woman who got on in Iowa and was headed to Chicago, even though it was only a half day trip she had taken a sleeper compartment since it cost just $20 more and included lunch. That seems definitely worth it to me. Little did I know this was to be my last meal (probably ever) on real china in the Amtrak dining car as most routes had already changed to plastic as a cost cutting measure.

We approached Chicago around 4:00 just about an hour behind schedule. Coming into the city we passed a large freight yard with containers – Yao Ming, Hanjin, Matson the same names I see every day in my neighborhood in Oakland. Seems like there should be some economy to be gained in moving freight and passengers by the same system. I
wondered how much faster the containers had gotten there than I had. We arrived Union Station, Chicago 4:11pm, Monday. I said goodbyes to my fellow travelers and gleefully headed up the platform away from the California Zephyr. Union Station is a beautiful, enormous, old building in the middle of downtown Chicago. I had three hours until the Lakeshore Limited left for New York. I found the Amtrak lounge, checked my bags had a soda and some pretzels and headed out to make the most of the short time I had to stretch my legs and explore Chicago.



Part I; Part II; Part IV

So I Looked At The Scenery (part 2 of a 4 part series)

There is something extraordinarily comforting about being tucked away in a sleeping compartment hurtling through the pitch-black night. The rocking of the train, the just audible click clack of the wheels and occasional muffled sound hoot of the horn remind you that the world doesn’t stop when you’re sleeping yet sleep you must as you can’t see anything in the darkness outside the window. I slept surprisingly well only waking occasionally when the train stopped. At 7:00am Joyce was on the PA announcing first call for breakfast. I peeked out my window to see the morning sun shining on the Utah scrub just outside Salt Lake City. On my way up to breakfast I saw Tony who offered to put away my bed while I was dining. I breakfasted with Blue, the other occupant of bottom half of car 32012. A recent college graduate she was on her way home to Washington DC from Oakland where she had been job searching and visiting friends. She had taken the same train in March and told me of the beauty of the snow and the large numbers of eagles and animals she had seen along the way. With breakfast over I decided to try out the shower. The shower room was perfectly sufficient, a small counter to put stuff on, a bench to sit on and lay your clothes out and a small shower stall about the size you might have in you home complete with handles to steady yourself as the train swerves. Amtrak provides soap, towels and washcloths but no shampoo and somehow I hadn’t brought any. But lucky me someone had left shampoo in the shower so I used that – sorry person. Now ready to start my day I packed my tote bag with newspaper, notebook, camera, book, binoculars, and camera, grabbed one more cup of coffee and headed to the lounge car for a day of sightseeing.

The super liner lounge car is a light, airy comfortable place to spend some time. Half of it is taken up by roomy tables where people can eat or play games and the other end is cluster of 3-4 seats facing the windows, downstairs is a small area selling food and a few more tables. The lounge car is also open to the coach customers but on this leg of the journey it was not crowded. The route between Salt Lake City and Denver is indescribably beautiful; the only thing I can say is if you have never been there by car or by train – go. Getting caught up in day to day life it is easy to forget how majestic America is, but his route will take your breath away at every turn. The desert mesas and rock formations in Utah never cease to amaze me. We were lucky enough to have a conductor with a vast knowledge of the area and among other things told us tales of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid’s train robberies, remarked on where to see the best ancient petroglyphs if you were to drive through the area, and pointed out old ghost towns left from the uranium boom.

I had planned on reading in the morning but I didn’t want to miss any scenery so instead I took hundreds of pictures and jotted things in my notebook as did the guy sitting next to me (a student from Holland who had been a semester at the University of Hawaii and was on his way back home). He’s the only other person I saw on the train taking notes and I often wondered what he was writing and then also wondered if he was wondering what I was writing. The California Zephyr follows the Colorado river for 238 miles into the Rockies. The tracks run right along the river as the canyon walls rise up on either side, impressing on me that there really aren’t too many ways to get through these mountains and raising anticipation of getting to the other side. With the river running alongside I lunched with a British couple who had been in the Falklands for twenty years but were now retired and headed back to England.

At Grand Junction there was a crew change which meant we could get out and walk around for about fifteen minutes during wich I composed a consist: Engine 173; Engine 193; Baggage 1127; Sleeper 39006; Sleeper 32012; Sleeper 32031; Dining 38050; Lounge 33028; Coach 34008; Coach 31003; Coach 31034; Freight 74101; Freight 74014.

Approximately 5:35pm we entered the Moffat Tunnel 6 miles and over ten minutes of darkness then you burst out into the sunshine onto the other side of the continental divide. As we wound down to Denver I had dinner with Blue, Jack and Suzanne, it was fun to have our little compartment together for a meal though the service was rather poor that night. At Denver a lot of people got on and off, even though it was 8:30pm the dining car has to feed anyone getting on before 9:00pm. I had Tony make up my bed shortly after leaving Denver, set my watch another hour ahead and snuggled in to my bed for another night on the rails.

PartI; Part III; Part IV

Far Away From Home (part 1 of a 4 part series)

On the last Saturday in May I walked out my door early in the morning on my way to the Amtrak station to start my three and a half day coast to coast journey. In the interminably long ride in my apartment elevator I struck up a good morning conversation with a neighbor and mentioned I was off to New York via Amtrak. She replied that she had made the same journey several years ago and assured me I would love the trip. So I confidently boarded the Capitol for Emeryville right on time 8:55am. First stop Emeryville 9:05 I detrained and after showing my ticket to several Amtrak attendants found sleeping car 32012of the California Zephyr to which I was assigned. Tony introduced himself as the car attendant, took my bag and showed me to my compartment. Small isn’t a compact enough word to describe the roomette. However, my suitcase easily fit sideways on the shelf next to the seat and there was a small closet to store shoes and a few shirts. Tony showed me how to turn on the lights, adjust the PA and most importantly use the yellow button to call him should I ever need anything. Tony proved to be the perfect mix of helpful, unobtrusive and generally pleasant over the next two days. I was initially a bit disappointed to be on the lower level of the two level Superliner(click here and here for a diagrams); however; as the journey wore on it proved to be a wonderfully private, quiet and friendly space.

In Martinez Jack and Suzanne boarded into the compartment across from me. All the way to Chicago in our end of the train the only other occupied room was the one next to theirs; by Blue who got on in Emeryville. Soon after pulling away from Sacramento the first lunch call was announced at 12:00 noon. Jack, Suzanne and I headed over to the dining car for our first Amtrak dining experience. I was pleasantly surprised to see the tables set with real china as I had read Amtrak was cutting back on dining car service. Dining car meals on Amtrak are a singularly wonderful experience. You share a meal with random people also on a journey and everyone has all the time in the world to tell their story. As is the case with many people I would meet I learned Jack and Suzanne don’t fly but it doesn’t stop them from going places. Lunch was very busy with a waiting list of 15 at one point. After lunch we started climbing into the Sierra’s and up to Donner Pass. By the time we got to Truckee it was snowing! I spent a large part of the afternoon in the lounge car where I was also able to buy an extra blanket (note: next time bring an extra blanket for lounging). During the day Tony kept a supply of bottled water, juices and coffee available at all times for which I was very thankful as the mountain air was dry. The train wound along the Truckee river for a time with beautiful views of snow capped mountains and green fields. An old wood flume goes along the Truckee river bringing water to hydroelectric plants serving the Truckee Meadows Water Authority. As I watched the Truckee river I saw a coyote standing along the bank staring at the river with hopes of an evening meal. During the afternoon Joyce the dining car Chief came around taking reservations for dinner time slots. I chose 7:00 figuring a meal would be a good way to spend the evening.

At dinner I was seated with an older couple and an elderly gentleman traveling by himself, all three people who don’t fly. Mostly I listened to old Navy stories and tales of the older man’s three thousand mile train journey through China. As is usually the case at dinner we lingered over decaf coffee well past 8:00 enjoying the company as we wound our way down into the desert of Nevada. We reached Winnemucca about 9:00 and I had Tony make up my bed shortly after leaving the station. As I would each night I set my clock ahead an hour before going to bed and settled in for my first night on the train.

Part II; Part III; PartIV;

Thirteen thoughts while standing on the wrong side of a freight train

• Might as well get comfortable I'll be here for a while
• Union Pacific ... Building America - hmmm, delivering goods to America perhaps but building America, I don't know about that one.
  
• Still wondering why freight trains are stacked with the longer container on top of the shorter container.
• If my throat didn't hurt so much I would contemplate hopping the freight train
• The train is made up of unusually American container companies, no Hanjiin or Hyundai perhaps due to this being a Union Pacific instead of BNSF.
  
• Some of the wheels are held on by lug nuts in the customary round formation like the wheels on cars but some are in a more triangular formation.
• Luckily I'm not in a rush to get anywhere when the train comes by, I just get to enjoy watching it.
• Wish I had brought my camera
• What a perfect seventy degree day
• Wonder if the box of illicit materials my brother brought me from SE Asia arrived today.
• I must be able to blog about this train
• Do they really need to blow the whistle so loud when the engineer can see noone is in the intersection
• People next to me are crossing the street so the cars can move as soon as the train is done. Time to go.