I often think about them... the people I've shared meals and cocktails with on my Amtrak journeys. Are they well? Are they still... well, are they still with us? Did their daughter get that job she was going for? Did the little boy get the pony he was hoping to get for his birthday? Did the grandmother seeing her granddaughter for the very first time have the best visit ever, and did she see her husband's eyes looking back at her? And did the man retracing the path he rode with his bride 50 years earlier, now doing so in her memory, experience the clarity he sought?
Many people have sat across the table from me. Many men, women and children have gazed upon my face and listened to my story. Some were great... memorable for the best reasons. Some, not so much. Some impressed me deeply and others I couldn't wait to be done with. Once I dined with a couple who happened, by coincidence, to be from the next town over from where I live... and we were both 3000 miles from home!
But the most amazing thing about them is that without Amtrak, I would never have met ANY of them... and how empty my memories would be without having shared their lives, even if it was only for 1/2 an hour.
So many people talk about the scenery. It IS beautiful, don't get me wrong. But for my money, it's just as beautiful INSIDE the train, where people from diverse walks of life share a meal or a drink, and experience together the joy of seeing America at eye-level... face to face... the way it should be seen.
If you have never ridden, DO IT! If you have ridden, share your experiences. And if you happen see me sitting alone at a table, stop and say "Hello!" I'll be pleased to add you to my memories!
Happy rails, America!
Friday, September 1, 2017
Friday, July 1, 2016
Day 9 - New Orleans, LA
It is Monday, June 20th, 2016 and I can't stand having this beard another minute! I walk the three blocks to the CVS and buy shaving stuff. Hey, look, they have a liquor section in the CVS! I come from Pennsylvania where all of the liquor stores are state owned. You can't just buy alcohol anywhere in good ol' Pennsylvania. Back at the Whitney I hack away at that untamed jungle until my baby-faced self emerges again. Ah! Got to remember to put sunscreen on my face now.
This is the first time in 9 days that I don't have to catch a train, be on a train, or get off of a train. I head home tomorrow, bright and early, at 7:00 am on The Crescent. But for now, I have the city to explore and I decide to do it on foot, not on a bus or a trolley or any other conveyance.
Thanks to that unbelievably comfortable hotel bed I slept until after 11 am so it was too late for breakfast. I decided to walk to the Casino and see if there were any good burger places in there. I haven't had a burger since before I left home and I'm sure there have to be some restaurants in there. I have a somewhat decent burger at Fuddrucker's and decide to walk it off by heading down to the River Walk.
From Harrah's casino to the Mississippi River is about 700 feet. In between you come to the place where the Canal Street trolley turns around. Well, not really. They don't turn the car around physically. Each car has a control at either end and a pantograph at either end. The car pulls onto the correct track using a turnout junction. They get out and pull the pantograph down and secure it then go and raise the one on the other end. They return to the now-front control station and the car is ready to go back in the other direction. It's such a novel way to get around the city
I watch the process a couple of times before continuing on to the River. This is one honking huge river, boy-howdy and dontchaknow? I can understand why so much literature was written about it. This is the second time I've seen it in this trip. The first time was hundreds of miles north of here if travelling by the river, when I crossed in Iowa way back on Day 2. Maybe even thousands of miles. Who knows with how this river twists and turns. It is muddy. Every time I've ever seen it, it's been muddy. And moving pretty swiftly too. There must have been storms recently. Two large ships go past me in the 1/2 hour or so that I stood there watching. One, a huge tanker and the other a ridiculously long barge set. According to a sign the main channel at this point of the river is more than 200 feet deep. I can't envision this. If you dropped the Statue of Liberty in the Mississippi River at New Orleans, it would still have over 50 feet of water above it.
Walking north... south?... it's hard to tell what direction in this town... walking downstream, which strangely enough happens to be due north at this location, you pass the S. S. Natchez. It's a paddle-wheel boat that offers "cruises" up and down the river. I took one last time so I skipped it this trip. I had dinner on my cruise in 2014 and there was a live band. Surprise surprise... a live band in New Orleans. You can't swing a cat in this town and not hit some kind of musical act. And them Saints sure do go marchin' in a lot down here.
The French Market has some intriguing shops and I buy a few trinkets no one really needs and then head off to explore Jackson Square. This is apparently the place where Louisiana was declared a territory of the U.S.A. in 1803 following the Louisiana Purchase. There's a big-ass statue of Andrew Jackson on a horse that you see all time on TV. Standing at the gate and looking at the building kind of reminds me of Cinderella's Castle at Disney World. And there are horses. Lots of horses. And there is lots of what horses produce. I don't linger long at Jackson Square.
It's about 95 degrees and really humid. A freak rain shower happens when a lone cloud drifts overhead. It's really strange because the sun is out and the sky is otherwise clear, yet it is raining and enough that people begin to seek shelter. I think it feels great. Bring it on! But it doesn't last and it only serves to increase the humidity so I hightail it back to my room, by way of the casino where I decide to sacrifice $20 of my hard earned dollars in the off chance I might strike it rich. I get down to only $5 left and hit for $20 which I leave in the tray and play the last $5 of my own money. I lose it, of course. I put the $20 I won back into the machine getting nothing to show for my time and I decide to head back outside.
I wander up and down streets with names I can't pronounce and enjoy the architecture that they just don't do anymore. Every street, no matter how small, has shops on it. Tiny hole-in-the-wall restaurants or bars with gaudy neon signs and some clever name. The sounds of jazz permeates the air everywhere you go, drifting from one to another as you pass the various establishments, sometimes overlapping in peculiar ways. The old balconies look pretty unstable to me. I can't imagine loading them up with people at Mardi Gras. Speaking of Mardi Gras, there are beads stuck in most of the trees. Sometimes on the telephone wires. They just never made it to where they were going and now they are a constant reminder of this city's Let the Good Times Roll attitude.
I choose a small restaurant whose name I can't even remember and have a big plateful of Jambalaya. Even the mild recipe makes the sweat pour from my head but it's sooooo goood. There are whole shrimp in it with their heads still on. I've never seen that before. The waiter hands me a printed sheet with instructions on how to "suck the head" but I am repulsed by the thought and choose not to add that to my New Orleans experience. If I wasted something special I choose to remain unaware of it. I wash down the Jambalaya with a locally brewed wheat beer that I actually like. I'm a hard person to please where beer is concerned but this one I like. A band comes onto the stage as I am finishing up dinner so I have some coffee and beignets and listen to a few songs, idly chatting with some of the other patrons. Curious, I pick up a box of pralenes on the way out the door. I've never tried them before.
OMG. These are sweeter than the Amtrak Chocolate Mousse of which I've spoken! I better not eat anymore of these or I won't get to sleep, and I have to be up at 5 am. Good luck with that unbelievably comfortable hotel bed.
Back to the Whitney and do a little blogging... check in at home and then off to bed early. I need to be at the station by 6:15 am.
Continued on Day 10
This is the first time in 9 days that I don't have to catch a train, be on a train, or get off of a train. I head home tomorrow, bright and early, at 7:00 am on The Crescent. But for now, I have the city to explore and I decide to do it on foot, not on a bus or a trolley or any other conveyance.
Thanks to that unbelievably comfortable hotel bed I slept until after 11 am so it was too late for breakfast. I decided to walk to the Casino and see if there were any good burger places in there. I haven't had a burger since before I left home and I'm sure there have to be some restaurants in there. I have a somewhat decent burger at Fuddrucker's and decide to walk it off by heading down to the River Walk.
From Harrah's casino to the Mississippi River is about 700 feet. In between you come to the place where the Canal Street trolley turns around. Well, not really. They don't turn the car around physically. Each car has a control at either end and a pantograph at either end. The car pulls onto the correct track using a turnout junction. They get out and pull the pantograph down and secure it then go and raise the one on the other end. They return to the now-front control station and the car is ready to go back in the other direction. It's such a novel way to get around the city
I watch the process a couple of times before continuing on to the River. This is one honking huge river, boy-howdy and dontchaknow? I can understand why so much literature was written about it. This is the second time I've seen it in this trip. The first time was hundreds of miles north of here if travelling by the river, when I crossed in Iowa way back on Day 2. Maybe even thousands of miles. Who knows with how this river twists and turns. It is muddy. Every time I've ever seen it, it's been muddy. And moving pretty swiftly too. There must have been storms recently. Two large ships go past me in the 1/2 hour or so that I stood there watching. One, a huge tanker and the other a ridiculously long barge set. According to a sign the main channel at this point of the river is more than 200 feet deep. I can't envision this. If you dropped the Statue of Liberty in the Mississippi River at New Orleans, it would still have over 50 feet of water above it.
Walking north... south?... it's hard to tell what direction in this town... walking downstream, which strangely enough happens to be due north at this location, you pass the S. S. Natchez. It's a paddle-wheel boat that offers "cruises" up and down the river. I took one last time so I skipped it this trip. I had dinner on my cruise in 2014 and there was a live band. Surprise surprise... a live band in New Orleans. You can't swing a cat in this town and not hit some kind of musical act. And them Saints sure do go marchin' in a lot down here.
The French Market has some intriguing shops and I buy a few trinkets no one really needs and then head off to explore Jackson Square. This is apparently the place where Louisiana was declared a territory of the U.S.A. in 1803 following the Louisiana Purchase. There's a big-ass statue of Andrew Jackson on a horse that you see all time on TV. Standing at the gate and looking at the building kind of reminds me of Cinderella's Castle at Disney World. And there are horses. Lots of horses. And there is lots of what horses produce. I don't linger long at Jackson Square.
It's about 95 degrees and really humid. A freak rain shower happens when a lone cloud drifts overhead. It's really strange because the sun is out and the sky is otherwise clear, yet it is raining and enough that people begin to seek shelter. I think it feels great. Bring it on! But it doesn't last and it only serves to increase the humidity so I hightail it back to my room, by way of the casino where I decide to sacrifice $20 of my hard earned dollars in the off chance I might strike it rich. I get down to only $5 left and hit for $20 which I leave in the tray and play the last $5 of my own money. I lose it, of course. I put the $20 I won back into the machine getting nothing to show for my time and I decide to head back outside.
I wander up and down streets with names I can't pronounce and enjoy the architecture that they just don't do anymore. Every street, no matter how small, has shops on it. Tiny hole-in-the-wall restaurants or bars with gaudy neon signs and some clever name. The sounds of jazz permeates the air everywhere you go, drifting from one to another as you pass the various establishments, sometimes overlapping in peculiar ways. The old balconies look pretty unstable to me. I can't imagine loading them up with people at Mardi Gras. Speaking of Mardi Gras, there are beads stuck in most of the trees. Sometimes on the telephone wires. They just never made it to where they were going and now they are a constant reminder of this city's Let the Good Times Roll attitude.
I choose a small restaurant whose name I can't even remember and have a big plateful of Jambalaya. Even the mild recipe makes the sweat pour from my head but it's sooooo goood. There are whole shrimp in it with their heads still on. I've never seen that before. The waiter hands me a printed sheet with instructions on how to "suck the head" but I am repulsed by the thought and choose not to add that to my New Orleans experience. If I wasted something special I choose to remain unaware of it. I wash down the Jambalaya with a locally brewed wheat beer that I actually like. I'm a hard person to please where beer is concerned but this one I like. A band comes onto the stage as I am finishing up dinner so I have some coffee and beignets and listen to a few songs, idly chatting with some of the other patrons. Curious, I pick up a box of pralenes on the way out the door. I've never tried them before.
OMG. These are sweeter than the Amtrak Chocolate Mousse of which I've spoken! I better not eat anymore of these or I won't get to sleep, and I have to be up at 5 am. Good luck with that unbelievably comfortable hotel bed.
Back to the Whitney and do a little blogging... check in at home and then off to bed early. I need to be at the station by 6:15 am.
Continued on Day 10
Wednesday, June 29, 2016
Day 8 - On the way to New Orleans
It's Sunday, June 19, 2016 (I cheated and looked at my calendar).
Here at San Antonio the Sunset Limited splits and part of the train becomes the Texas Eagle, heading to Chicago. The Texas Eagle is still on my wishlist of Amtrak routes. Maybe next summer... The rest of it goes on to New Orleans. In a normal schedule this process takes from 4:50 am to 6:40 am, so just under 2 hours. We must have made up some serious time during the night. I wonder if we will be fed today. I decide that the best way to find out is to go to the dining car, which is only about 15 feet from where I sit.
We stay at Houston barely long enough for me to call my father and wish him a happy Father's Day, enjoy a brief but refreshing rain-shower, and we pull out of the station now only 17 minutes behind schedule. I would never have believed it.
When it is plugged in and charging, my cell phone makes a beep when the power is lost. It makes that beep and wakes me up. We are not moving. I've become used to the sensation of not moving. Where are we? What time is it? How late are we, anyway?
San Antonio. 6:40 am (presumably Mountain Time). The Sunset Limited is SUPPOSED to pull out of San Antonio at 6:25 am, so we are currently 15 minutes behind schedule. Remind me to apologize to Jay.
San Antonio. 6:40 am (presumably Mountain Time). The Sunset Limited is SUPPOSED to pull out of San Antonio at 6:25 am, so we are currently 15 minutes behind schedule. Remind me to apologize to Jay.
Here at San Antonio the Sunset Limited splits and part of the train becomes the Texas Eagle, heading to Chicago. The Texas Eagle is still on my wishlist of Amtrak routes. Maybe next summer... The rest of it goes on to New Orleans. In a normal schedule this process takes from 4:50 am to 6:40 am, so just under 2 hours. We must have made up some serious time during the night. I wonder if we will be fed today. I decide that the best way to find out is to go to the dining car, which is only about 15 feet from where I sit.
There is activity in there. That's a good sign. I poke my head in to ask Elvis, er, um, Patty what's for breakfast. She says they will make an announcement shortly, that they are bringing food aboard from a local restaurant... and she hopes I like Tex-Mex. Tex-Mex is fine, but for breakfast? I return to my room and complete my morning ablutions. At 7:25 am the train departs San Antonio. We are now less than an hour behind schedule.
BUT, and this is a BIG BUT, due to the recent flooding in the Houston area, our next stop, we are going to be rerouted onto the BNSF line to get us around the bridge over the Brazos River at Richmond which was damaged in the flooding. This may add up to an hour and a half to our lateness.
During the re-route the breakfast announcement comes. They've brought aboard some breakfast burritos from a nice restaurant in San Antonio and sleeper passengers are invited to come and partake. We are only using half of the dining car this morning since the A/C appears to be working in one half but not the other half. We have our choice of ham, sausage or beef breakfast burritos. I choose beef. It's ok. Not great. Not what I would have chosen, but again, it's food and I won't starve. At least not this morning. There's also that Amtrak coffee and I have 3 cups, plus one to go back to my room with. Might as well bounce off the walls if I'm going to be stuck on this train for the rest of the day.
To my surprise the reroute goes smoothly, if not a little slowly, and we are greeted at the transfer point by a sizable number of rail-fans, (foamers) cameras in hand or mounted on tripods, getting some rare footage. I hope I get to see some of it online. We back into Houston station still less than an hour late. Another hour layover in Houston is part of the schedule but the conductor announces that we will cut this stop short in order to make up more time. They hope to get us into New Orleans fairly close to schedule. We'll see.
We stay at Houston barely long enough for me to call my father and wish him a happy Father's Day, enjoy a brief but refreshing rain-shower, and we pull out of the station now only 17 minutes behind schedule. I would never have believed it.
Around noon, Patty/Elvis announces that there are two lunch seatings, 12:00 and 1:30, come whenever you like. There are two choices only, a dinner salad to which you can add chicken if you like or barbecued pork shanks (we call them short-ribs where I come from). Sorry, but they can only offer these items because they can't use the grill, lest the diner become a sauna again. I have the shanks. They are delicious. I am getting hungry again just thinking about them.
It seems that we have left the desert and mountains behind. We seem to be in bayou country but it's a little early for that. Perhaps what I am seeing is the remnants of the horrible flooding this area experienced in the past few weeks. The train is moving slowly but steadily and we reach Beaumont only 25 minutes behind schedule.
A short delay at Lake Charles and we are once again under way, about 45 minutes late.
At Lafayette, LA I nearly have a heart attack when I step off the train for some fresh air and it starts to pull away. I am horrified, but it stops a few hundred feet away and I make my way quickly to the door. The platform here is too short to accommodate the whole train so they have to pull forward to board the coach passengers. I call the Whitney Hotel in New Orleans to let them know I may be late. They say it's fine.
For dinner tonight, Elvis is offering either a hamburger or a veggie burger. I opt out and decide to get something at New Orleans. I eat my extra cookie for dinner. My Grandmother would not approve.
THIS is bayou country. Lowlands. Lots and lots of water. Everywhere you look, more water. I see Snowy Egrets wading in rice fields. I am looking for alligators. I don't see any. Is that good or bad? The sun goes down and I decide it's time to pack up my stuff. It's amazing to me how quickly you can clutter a roomette with your junk. I have everything I brought. Good.
Another thing I find interesting is that it seems like the last 5 miles of the trip takes forever. We are navigating train yards and junctions galore. I hope the driver knows where he is going, I'm starting to get hungry and I'm out of cookies.
We cross the Huey P. Long bridge. I know it holds some kind of distinction but I'm just too tired to go and find out what it is. More switching and more yards and finally the announcement comes that we will be making three stops as we back into New Orleans... the first is to change direction and the second is a safety stop 50 feet short of the platform. The third stop is when you can detrain.
Jay offers to carry my suitcase down to the vestibule. I don't let him because it's REALLY heavy. He says no problem and lifts it like it's made of Styrofoam. This is a man who has been carrying people's luggage for 24 years. We stand and chat during the final moments into New Orleans. He's been a real trooper and I tip him well for his service. I forgot to tip Patty / Elvis in the dining car. Oh well, too late now. My bad.
We arrive in New Orleans 1 hour and 4 minutes late. I can live with this. By some miracle I am the first to detrain and the first to reach the taxi queue. I am in my room at the Whitney by 10:55 pm. Too late for dinner but not too late for a nosh in the Bistro downstairs. Some light snacks and off to bed in what just might be the most comfortable hotel bed I've ever slept in. I wonder if I can fit this into my suitcase?
Tomorrow, I explore New Orleans on foot.
Monday, June 27, 2016
Day 7 - Aboard the Sunset Limited to New Orleans
I think it's a Saturday, I guess. No, wait... Yes! Yes. It is. Saturday, June something or other... who cares?
From Pomona, California where I went to sleep to Yuma, Arizona where we are now, is 220 miles. That's how far my train has managed to go since I went to sleep. It is now 6:35 am. No one really knows WHAT time zone, though, because Arizona doesn't participate in Daylight Savings Time. The rules for remembering what time it is in Arizona are far too complicated for me to ponder at this hour and before my Amtrak Coffee... I swear they should put a trademark on that stuff and sell it. I'd buy it. I ask Google what timezone I am in and she tells me Mountain Standard Time. Big help she is, but I learn that we did lose an hour during the night. One of the pitfalls of eastbound travel is shorter days.
Anyway, as usual, I digress. Since I went to sleep somewhere around midnight until I awoke at 6:35 am, so roughly 6 1/2 hours... we have traveled 220 miles. That's an average speed of 34.64 miles per hour. The train should have arrived at Yuma, Arizona at 2:47 am. I would rather this leg of my journey be early rather than late, since my scheduled arrival time in New Orleans is 9:40 pm on Sunday night. That just sounds late to me, even though I know there is no such time as "Late" in New Orleans. I'd rather get there early, get checked in, and be done with it. Looks like I can forget that.
Jay, my At-Times-Obnoxiously-Upbeat-Sleeping-Car-Attendant (ATOUSCA) says that it is far too early in the trip to start worrying about how far behind we are because there are hours {he stressed HOURS and made a hand motion I didn't quite understand} to play with at station stops like San Antonio and Houston and he wouldn't be surprised at all if we actually get into New Orleans on time or even a little early. Right. And then the unicorns and the leprechauns will form a magical chain with their hands and hooves and instantly transport you to your hotel on a river of sparkles!
If I'm a glass-half-full kind of guy then Jay is a Glass is Overflowing kind of guy. But we have some lemons, so let's make lemonade.
1) My ride will be longer than expected. That's nice. I like long train rides.
2) I'll get to see the desert of Arizona, which just might be my favorite state of all the ones I've seen so far, that I'd otherwise have missed if the train was not running 3:20 minutes late.
3) I've prepaid for my room in New Orleans so no matter how late we get in, my room will be waiting for me. The OCD in me will still call the hotel tomorrow from Lafayette, LA to confirm that I WILL be arriving, like they are sitting there drumming their fingers waiting for me to get there.
4) I don't have anything planned or paid for in advance aside from my hotel in New Orleans, so chill out and enjoy Arizona.
Off to the dining car for breakfast. It's a bit toasty in there, but it IS the desert of Arizona and it IS full of people... who are all looking a bit warm... I sit with the couple across the hall who live near me and we chat idly about the usual minutiae that train travelers chat about. Breakfast comes. It's noticeably hotter in here. We finish our meal and head back to our rooms, which of course Jay has expertly transformed for daytime use, and settle in to chat.
Not too long afterward the Dining Car Attendant comes through with lunch reservations. We have our choice of 12:00 or 12:30. Odd, since we are the first sleeper behind the diner and I know that they start there and not at the back of the train. So, OK, only 2 seatings for lunch. It must be because of the time zones thing making the lunch period shorter than usual. Eastbound I change my habit of taking the earliest seating and go for the later to extend the time between meals so I choose 12:30, and take my reservation ticket.
This part of the world is decorated differently than any other part. There are many dry washes, which can easily become raging torrents without warning if it happens to rain somewhere nearby. Moments later they are dry again. I've seen it happen with my own eyes. I see cactus. Saguaro (sah-WAH-roe) to be specific. It's been a very long time since I've seen one of those. Ocotillo (oh-coh-TEE-oh) abound here as well. These are the whip-tail like plants that you see in clumps. They have the unique ability to produce leaves and flowers in a ridiculously short time if they get rained on. Joshua trees. Yucca. Ball cactus. Cholla (CHOY-uh). Opuntia. Mesquite. Creosote. Sage brush. Agave. It's a gardener's dream here. These are things I just don't see at home. Behind it all are the mountains. Different from the Mojave desert mountains, these don't have the stria that indicate a sedimentary origin. These are volcanic in origin. Cinder cones dot the landscape. And the occasional basalt plug surrounded by an eroded cinder cone... a volcano that died young.
The sun is intense. I need my sunglasses in my room. I wonder if sunscreen would be advisable. I ask Google if U/V rays can pass through glass and I am relieved to learn that they can't so I forget about the sunscreen.
We stop at Tuscon. We are no later than we were at Yuma but no earlier either. It is 110 degrees out and not a cloud in the sky. I overhear the dining car attendant and the conductor discussing the situation in the diner. It's not looking good.
Back on board and back in my room the announcement no one wanted to hear comes: "Attention passengers. Those of you who HAD lunch reservations in the dining room no longer have them. The A/C in that car has failed. It is 120 degrees in the kitchen and 105 in the dining room. The conductor has made the decision to close that car. We will make a further announcement when we have figured out how we are going to feed you all." And, since she apparently thinks she is Elvis Presley, "Thank you. Thank you very much"... with muuuuuccchhhh drawn out in perhaps the worst E/P impression I have ever witnessed.
Ok. It's a little warm in the sleeper too but so far the A/C is keeping up with it. Time to break out one of those cookies I stashed back at Union Station. I don't know when or what I might get for lunch. We stop at El Paso, passing within 50 feet of the Mexican border. It is 105 F.
"Lunch" arrived at 4:57 pm in the form of Subway turkey sandwiches that they brought aboard at El Paso. This was handed to me by Jay along with a small bottle of water. Far from the Angus steak burger I had planned on, but at least it's food and I won't starve. If lunch comes at 4:57 pm when will dinner be? WHAT will dinner be?
At 10:45 pm I gave up waiting and went to bed. Amtrak has disappointed me again with regard to food service. Now, before I get nasty letters, I am NOT one of those people who thinks that Amtrak is a rolling hotel and that I should be pampered while I am on board. I understand that things break down. I understand that there are hundreds of miles between stations on this route so coordinating things is difficult. But what is NOT acceptable is that nothing at all was offered. They COULD have said: Take your sleeping car ticket with you to the Cafe Car and you can purchase up to X-dollars of food free. X should be the cost of the highest priced menu item plus enough to cover desert. That's NOT what they said. Instead they essentially said: "Despite the fact that you've paid us to feed you we are not going to. You MAY, however, go to the lounge car where you can pay us even more money for worse food." So, boo on Amtrak for the way they handled this.
This is the first time in all the trips I've taken that anything like this has happened. It will not change my opinion of Amtrak and it will not stop me from riding Amtrak again. I will, of course, let them know that I think they messed up, but to their credit the dining car staff made the best of an at best difficult situation. As with all things dining car related, you win some, and you lose some.
Tomorrow is another day.
Continued on Day 8
From Pomona, California where I went to sleep to Yuma, Arizona where we are now, is 220 miles. That's how far my train has managed to go since I went to sleep. It is now 6:35 am. No one really knows WHAT time zone, though, because Arizona doesn't participate in Daylight Savings Time. The rules for remembering what time it is in Arizona are far too complicated for me to ponder at this hour and before my Amtrak Coffee... I swear they should put a trademark on that stuff and sell it. I'd buy it. I ask Google what timezone I am in and she tells me Mountain Standard Time. Big help she is, but I learn that we did lose an hour during the night. One of the pitfalls of eastbound travel is shorter days.
Anyway, as usual, I digress. Since I went to sleep somewhere around midnight until I awoke at 6:35 am, so roughly 6 1/2 hours... we have traveled 220 miles. That's an average speed of 34.64 miles per hour. The train should have arrived at Yuma, Arizona at 2:47 am. I would rather this leg of my journey be early rather than late, since my scheduled arrival time in New Orleans is 9:40 pm on Sunday night. That just sounds late to me, even though I know there is no such time as "Late" in New Orleans. I'd rather get there early, get checked in, and be done with it. Looks like I can forget that.
Jay, my At-Times-Obnoxiously-Upbeat-Sleeping-Car-Attendant (ATOUSCA) says that it is far too early in the trip to start worrying about how far behind we are because there are hours {he stressed HOURS and made a hand motion I didn't quite understand} to play with at station stops like San Antonio and Houston and he wouldn't be surprised at all if we actually get into New Orleans on time or even a little early. Right. And then the unicorns and the leprechauns will form a magical chain with their hands and hooves and instantly transport you to your hotel on a river of sparkles!
If I'm a glass-half-full kind of guy then Jay is a Glass is Overflowing kind of guy. But we have some lemons, so let's make lemonade.
1) My ride will be longer than expected. That's nice. I like long train rides.
2) I'll get to see the desert of Arizona, which just might be my favorite state of all the ones I've seen so far, that I'd otherwise have missed if the train was not running 3:20 minutes late.
3) I've prepaid for my room in New Orleans so no matter how late we get in, my room will be waiting for me. The OCD in me will still call the hotel tomorrow from Lafayette, LA to confirm that I WILL be arriving, like they are sitting there drumming their fingers waiting for me to get there.
4) I don't have anything planned or paid for in advance aside from my hotel in New Orleans, so chill out and enjoy Arizona.
Off to the dining car for breakfast. It's a bit toasty in there, but it IS the desert of Arizona and it IS full of people... who are all looking a bit warm... I sit with the couple across the hall who live near me and we chat idly about the usual minutiae that train travelers chat about. Breakfast comes. It's noticeably hotter in here. We finish our meal and head back to our rooms, which of course Jay has expertly transformed for daytime use, and settle in to chat.
Not too long afterward the Dining Car Attendant comes through with lunch reservations. We have our choice of 12:00 or 12:30. Odd, since we are the first sleeper behind the diner and I know that they start there and not at the back of the train. So, OK, only 2 seatings for lunch. It must be because of the time zones thing making the lunch period shorter than usual. Eastbound I change my habit of taking the earliest seating and go for the later to extend the time between meals so I choose 12:30, and take my reservation ticket.
This part of the world is decorated differently than any other part. There are many dry washes, which can easily become raging torrents without warning if it happens to rain somewhere nearby. Moments later they are dry again. I've seen it happen with my own eyes. I see cactus. Saguaro (sah-WAH-roe) to be specific. It's been a very long time since I've seen one of those. Ocotillo (oh-coh-TEE-oh) abound here as well. These are the whip-tail like plants that you see in clumps. They have the unique ability to produce leaves and flowers in a ridiculously short time if they get rained on. Joshua trees. Yucca. Ball cactus. Cholla (CHOY-uh). Opuntia. Mesquite. Creosote. Sage brush. Agave. It's a gardener's dream here. These are things I just don't see at home. Behind it all are the mountains. Different from the Mojave desert mountains, these don't have the stria that indicate a sedimentary origin. These are volcanic in origin. Cinder cones dot the landscape. And the occasional basalt plug surrounded by an eroded cinder cone... a volcano that died young.
The sun is intense. I need my sunglasses in my room. I wonder if sunscreen would be advisable. I ask Google if U/V rays can pass through glass and I am relieved to learn that they can't so I forget about the sunscreen.
We stop at Tuscon. We are no later than we were at Yuma but no earlier either. It is 110 degrees out and not a cloud in the sky. I overhear the dining car attendant and the conductor discussing the situation in the diner. It's not looking good.
Back on board and back in my room the announcement no one wanted to hear comes: "Attention passengers. Those of you who HAD lunch reservations in the dining room no longer have them. The A/C in that car has failed. It is 120 degrees in the kitchen and 105 in the dining room. The conductor has made the decision to close that car. We will make a further announcement when we have figured out how we are going to feed you all." And, since she apparently thinks she is Elvis Presley, "Thank you. Thank you very much"... with muuuuuccchhhh drawn out in perhaps the worst E/P impression I have ever witnessed.
Ok. It's a little warm in the sleeper too but so far the A/C is keeping up with it. Time to break out one of those cookies I stashed back at Union Station. I don't know when or what I might get for lunch. We stop at El Paso, passing within 50 feet of the Mexican border. It is 105 F.
"Lunch" arrived at 4:57 pm in the form of Subway turkey sandwiches that they brought aboard at El Paso. This was handed to me by Jay along with a small bottle of water. Far from the Angus steak burger I had planned on, but at least it's food and I won't starve. If lunch comes at 4:57 pm when will dinner be? WHAT will dinner be?
At 10:45 pm I gave up waiting and went to bed. Amtrak has disappointed me again with regard to food service. Now, before I get nasty letters, I am NOT one of those people who thinks that Amtrak is a rolling hotel and that I should be pampered while I am on board. I understand that things break down. I understand that there are hundreds of miles between stations on this route so coordinating things is difficult. But what is NOT acceptable is that nothing at all was offered. They COULD have said: Take your sleeping car ticket with you to the Cafe Car and you can purchase up to X-dollars of food free. X should be the cost of the highest priced menu item plus enough to cover desert. That's NOT what they said. Instead they essentially said: "Despite the fact that you've paid us to feed you we are not going to. You MAY, however, go to the lounge car where you can pay us even more money for worse food." So, boo on Amtrak for the way they handled this.
This is the first time in all the trips I've taken that anything like this has happened. It will not change my opinion of Amtrak and it will not stop me from riding Amtrak again. I will, of course, let them know that I think they messed up, but to their credit the dining car staff made the best of an at best difficult situation. As with all things dining car related, you win some, and you lose some.
Tomorrow is another day.
Continued on Day 8
Sunday, June 26, 2016
Day 6 - Waiting on The Sunset Limited
Day 6 - Friday, June 17, 2016 - Los Angeles California.
What I am about to describe many people may consider a waste of a day in L.A. but for me, having a day to just meld into the city and not be "that guy taking pictures of road signs" for a while. Like, maybe I am meeting my cousin at the train or something...
So, the checkout time for The Metro Plaza is 11:00 am and I plan to use every one of those minutes. At the last possible minute I check out and head across the street to Union Station. It is blisteringly hot. I haven't shaven in 6 days. I am wearing my cloth cap and sunglasses. I look like the uni-bomber, only with nicer shoes.
If you've never been to Union Station, here is what to expect. If you HAVE been to Union Station, please let me know if I got this right.
No matter what entrance you use, the station swallows you up. It is so immensely large inside that you sort of wonder what they were thinking when they built such a thing. It's a bit overwhelming trying to take in the high ceilings with their insanely intricate wood working and chandeliers that look like they are the size of the tires on those Earth Movers you see that can carry a small town in their bucket. The floors are ceramic tile in terra-cotta colors, well worn by the millions of shoes and boots that have walked through this hall. You want to stop and gawk at it and just absorb it all but you have to remember that there are throngs of people who don't really care and just want to get to their trains and so you stand off to the side and breathe it in.
In the Main Waiting Room they have an open piano that anyone is welcome to play. As I made my way through to head to the Metropolitan lounge to check my luggage and get some of that Amtrak coffee, there was a young kid who was playing classical music like he'd been hearing it and only it since the day he was born. It came so naturally to him and he went into a trance-like state. He gathered an audience and seemed surprised to see that many people watching when he was finally finished. The next player was a little Asian girl of maybe 5 or 6 who wanted to play chop-sticks, much to the delight of the gathered audience.
I finally made it to the Metropolitan Lounge, one of the perks of sleeper or business class accommodations. It has ample comfortable seating. Each chair has it's own power outlets in the side and desk-like trays that swing in or away. There's a dedicated bathroom, a small conference style room with a large table, a kitchenette with cold drinks, coffee, muffins or some other form of pastry... I lucked out and got chocolate chip cookies! I'm not ashamed to admit that I stashed 2 of them in my bag for later on the train. I staked out my spot and set up my computer and actually posted the first entry of this blog, while waiting for a train that is not scheduled to leave for 10 hours!
After a while I decided it was lunch so I left my bags with the attendant and made my way to Traxx, an up-scale bistro style restaurant at the end of the main waiting room, adjacent to the old Ticketing Room, which is now defunct but is preserved and makes quite an attraction in and of itself. Lunch at Traxx was a patty melt with mushrooms added and pub-style fries. The mushrooms were quite juicy and made my roll soggy. I had to eat my patty melt with utensils. For the second time in 3 days I am eating a wet sandwich.
After I finished my wet sandwich I went back to see who was at the piano now. An older gentlemen had just taken the bench and was warming up his fingers with some rag-time runs when all of a sudden he broke into Linus and Lucy! People were getting up and moving to closer seats just so they could see this guy play. Here is his performance: Linus and Lucy at Union Station, Los Angeles.
He continued to play for at least the next 2 hours. His repertoire was impressive, from Beethoven to Whitney Houston and all from memory. He had clearly spent some time in front of a piano as a child.
I ventured out of the station to get some more photos and to explore Olvera Street, I think it what it's called. Essentially a giant open air market with 100 vendors all selling exactly the same stuff. It's in and around a central plaza style park with some amazing trees. I wandered a few blocks in either direction just to see what there was, but there really wasn't anything that exciting so I took my hairy face back to the lounge and did some more blogging and sorted out some of my photos I've taken so far.
At about 9:45 pm they finally called for the red-caps to take us to the train and by some stroke of luck I was the first to load. I guess it's only fair since I had been in that lounge the whole day. I was in my room on board number 2, the Sunset Limited, by 10:00pm. The train was due to leave at 10:00 pm but due to a situation on the Coast Starlight coming in from Seattle, that train was running late. Apparently someone had been struck by but not killed by the Coast Starlight and the crew requested relief, meaning a new crew to take over the route. As a result, we didn't pull out of the station until 11:34 pm. Doomed from the start.
By coincidence a couple in the room across from me were from about 50 miles away from where I live, so we had something to chat about as we waited for the train to leave. Jay, our attendant, had already introduced himself and done the usual attendant stuff by then. I went to sleep as the train passed Pomona.
Continued on Day 7
What I am about to describe many people may consider a waste of a day in L.A. but for me, having a day to just meld into the city and not be "that guy taking pictures of road signs" for a while. Like, maybe I am meeting my cousin at the train or something...
So, the checkout time for The Metro Plaza is 11:00 am and I plan to use every one of those minutes. At the last possible minute I check out and head across the street to Union Station. It is blisteringly hot. I haven't shaven in 6 days. I am wearing my cloth cap and sunglasses. I look like the uni-bomber, only with nicer shoes.
If you've never been to Union Station, here is what to expect. If you HAVE been to Union Station, please let me know if I got this right.
No matter what entrance you use, the station swallows you up. It is so immensely large inside that you sort of wonder what they were thinking when they built such a thing. It's a bit overwhelming trying to take in the high ceilings with their insanely intricate wood working and chandeliers that look like they are the size of the tires on those Earth Movers you see that can carry a small town in their bucket. The floors are ceramic tile in terra-cotta colors, well worn by the millions of shoes and boots that have walked through this hall. You want to stop and gawk at it and just absorb it all but you have to remember that there are throngs of people who don't really care and just want to get to their trains and so you stand off to the side and breathe it in.
In the Main Waiting Room they have an open piano that anyone is welcome to play. As I made my way through to head to the Metropolitan lounge to check my luggage and get some of that Amtrak coffee, there was a young kid who was playing classical music like he'd been hearing it and only it since the day he was born. It came so naturally to him and he went into a trance-like state. He gathered an audience and seemed surprised to see that many people watching when he was finally finished. The next player was a little Asian girl of maybe 5 or 6 who wanted to play chop-sticks, much to the delight of the gathered audience.
I finally made it to the Metropolitan Lounge, one of the perks of sleeper or business class accommodations. It has ample comfortable seating. Each chair has it's own power outlets in the side and desk-like trays that swing in or away. There's a dedicated bathroom, a small conference style room with a large table, a kitchenette with cold drinks, coffee, muffins or some other form of pastry... I lucked out and got chocolate chip cookies! I'm not ashamed to admit that I stashed 2 of them in my bag for later on the train. I staked out my spot and set up my computer and actually posted the first entry of this blog, while waiting for a train that is not scheduled to leave for 10 hours!
After a while I decided it was lunch so I left my bags with the attendant and made my way to Traxx, an up-scale bistro style restaurant at the end of the main waiting room, adjacent to the old Ticketing Room, which is now defunct but is preserved and makes quite an attraction in and of itself. Lunch at Traxx was a patty melt with mushrooms added and pub-style fries. The mushrooms were quite juicy and made my roll soggy. I had to eat my patty melt with utensils. For the second time in 3 days I am eating a wet sandwich.
After I finished my wet sandwich I went back to see who was at the piano now. An older gentlemen had just taken the bench and was warming up his fingers with some rag-time runs when all of a sudden he broke into Linus and Lucy! People were getting up and moving to closer seats just so they could see this guy play. Here is his performance: Linus and Lucy at Union Station, Los Angeles.
He continued to play for at least the next 2 hours. His repertoire was impressive, from Beethoven to Whitney Houston and all from memory. He had clearly spent some time in front of a piano as a child.
I ventured out of the station to get some more photos and to explore Olvera Street, I think it what it's called. Essentially a giant open air market with 100 vendors all selling exactly the same stuff. It's in and around a central plaza style park with some amazing trees. I wandered a few blocks in either direction just to see what there was, but there really wasn't anything that exciting so I took my hairy face back to the lounge and did some more blogging and sorted out some of my photos I've taken so far.
At about 9:45 pm they finally called for the red-caps to take us to the train and by some stroke of luck I was the first to load. I guess it's only fair since I had been in that lounge the whole day. I was in my room on board number 2, the Sunset Limited, by 10:00pm. The train was due to leave at 10:00 pm but due to a situation on the Coast Starlight coming in from Seattle, that train was running late. Apparently someone had been struck by but not killed by the Coast Starlight and the crew requested relief, meaning a new crew to take over the route. As a result, we didn't pull out of the station until 11:34 pm. Doomed from the start.
By coincidence a couple in the room across from me were from about 50 miles away from where I live, so we had something to chat about as we waited for the train to leave. Jay, our attendant, had already introduced himself and done the usual attendant stuff by then. I went to sleep as the train passed Pomona.
Continued on Day 7
Friday, June 24, 2016
Day 5
Day 5 - Los Angeles, California.
I had to set my alarm. But, I'm on vacation. Most people on vacation don't set their alarms. If I don't set my alarm, though, I'll miss my train.
Yes, that's right, my train. I've just ridden 3,412 miles by rail to arrive at the City of Angels and I am getting back on another train, for a three-hour ride... to San Diego. It's the Pacific Surfliner and there are several reasons I want to ride it:
First) It's cool. It runs right next to the ocean for quite a long time, sometimes right on the beach;
2) Riding this will make my trip coast-to-coast-almost*; and
C) I don't really care for Los Angeles. Sorry to all you Angelinos who may take offense to this but it's just really big and really loud and you can't walk anywhere from anywhere else and did I mention it's loud? Well it is. I live in the country. I don't hear traffic or sirens or helicopters like, ever.
So, before I digress and forget to explain, I put 'coast-to-coast-almost' because while Wilmington, DE and Baltimore, MD ARE seaports on the east coast and I originated this trip in Philadelphia, PA and passed through both of these cities and now I'll be riding the Pacific Surfliner with the Pacific Ocean literally lapping at the wheels of the train. So, if you accept Baltimore and Wilmington as coastal cities, then I've traversed the continent. Funny, I don't feel any different.
A little fuzzier than normal thanks to my now really hairy face, but none the worse for wear.
So the only logical thing to do with your only full day in a far away city after taking four days to get their by train, is to ride another train. So off to Union Station at 8:30 am for a 9:55 am train. I figured I'd eat breakfast in the Metropolitan Lounge since I am in business class and there will be coffee and muffins available there. I took my time getting to the Lounge because I thought I had plenty of time.
I walked in, showed the attendant my ticket and he points to the door and tells me to run after that Red Cap who will take me right to my train, which is boarding. Well, at least there will be coffee and muffins on the train.
The train is not boarding. The train is nowhere near the station. But at least I am at the platform and I got to watch the crew review their paperwork. It's amazing the details that they know well in advance on these trips. I'm not sure I was supposed to be able to watch this, but at least I didn't try to record it or anything so they just let me be. Afterward the conductor explained how the whole crew communicates together so that each knows where the other is, and they are all at their positions at the right times.
Business class guarantees you a seat in the business class car. It does NOT guarantee a good seat in that car. Upon boarding I of course found that all of the forward facing window seats on the right side of the train were taken. I did manage to find a rear-facing seat on the right side so I settled for that. You can't tell from my videos or pictures and I am not going to go so far as to claim that sitting backwards makes me nauseated or anything like that, but given my choice I will always sit facing forward first.
Right after San Juan Capestrano, where the swallows no longer come to roost, the train takes a southward curve and comes right up alongside the ocean. There are houses and parking lots and stuff in the way at first but then it clears up and there's the Pacific Ocean. Right there. The last time I saw the Pacific Ocean in person was in 1983.
Now, according to Wikipedia, in 2009 the swallows failed to return to roost at the Mission at San Juan Capestrano, as they had done for most of human memory. The article says that taller structures constructed north of the town were more suitable to the swallows than the smaller mission building there and so the town lost it's claim to fame and most likely some serious tourist money as well.
Before long you roll into San Clemente Pier station with the famous pier and the beach literally 15 feet from the train. After about an hour and a half of amazing coastal scenery with some mountainous terrain thrown in and a few coastal marshlands for added flavor and I am deposited at Old Town San Diego. I've been told this is an interesting place to kill a few hours before my return trip at 4:30 pm.
I have to say it held my attention. It had a lot of interesting plants for landscaping and the shops were in the style of a pueblo, surrounding an estate of the Estudillo family, accent on every syllable as the tour guide told me. I wandered aimlessly and purchased frivolous things like some hand made glass marbles and a few trinkets for souvenirs and more Jelly-Belly jelly beans that I really need. I had lunch in an open-air restaurant Casa de Reyes, or House of Kings for the Spanish-Impaired. I have to say I've never had a salad that had both mussels and avocado in it, but it was tasty. I wandered around outside of the Old Town area for a while and headed back to the train platform with about 15 minutes to spare.
For some reason, on the return trip to Los Angeles we got a snack pack and a choice of beverage, including wine. We got squat on the San Diego bound trip. Maybe they gave it out already before the train got to my boarding station. Oh well. This would not be the last time that Amtrak did not provide me with food that my ticket purchase included. More on that later.
An absolutely uneventful return trip... my seat mate was an Asian gentlemen who either could not or would not communicate with me and he detrained before San Clemente Pier so I got a forward facing window seat for at least much of the ride. It doesn't take much to make me happy.
For dinner I really didn't want anything heavy so I took my friend Chuck's advice and tried Phillippe, about 1 block from The Metro Plaza. They claim to have invented the French Dipped sandwich. I've never heard of a French Dipped sandwich so I didn't really know what to expect. It was a sandwich. Dipped in gravy. So, basically, a wet sandwich. It was good, I mean, I didn't gag on it or anything, but it was still just basically a wet sandwich. So far my two dinners in Los Angeles have been raw fish and a wet sandwich. I can't wait to get back on the train and have my Amtrak Signature Steak again.
But, will that ever happen? To find out you'll just have to keep reading my blog.
It's been a long day so I did some blogging, reviewed my videos and pics from the day, and called it a night. Tomorrow I have a whole day to kill at Union Station.
Continued on Day 6
I had to set my alarm. But, I'm on vacation. Most people on vacation don't set their alarms. If I don't set my alarm, though, I'll miss my train.
Yes, that's right, my train. I've just ridden 3,412 miles by rail to arrive at the City of Angels and I am getting back on another train, for a three-hour ride... to San Diego. It's the Pacific Surfliner and there are several reasons I want to ride it:
First) It's cool. It runs right next to the ocean for quite a long time, sometimes right on the beach;
2) Riding this will make my trip coast-to-coast-almost*; and
C) I don't really care for Los Angeles. Sorry to all you Angelinos who may take offense to this but it's just really big and really loud and you can't walk anywhere from anywhere else and did I mention it's loud? Well it is. I live in the country. I don't hear traffic or sirens or helicopters like, ever.
So, before I digress and forget to explain, I put 'coast-to-coast-almost' because while Wilmington, DE and Baltimore, MD ARE seaports on the east coast and I originated this trip in Philadelphia, PA and passed through both of these cities and now I'll be riding the Pacific Surfliner with the Pacific Ocean literally lapping at the wheels of the train. So, if you accept Baltimore and Wilmington as coastal cities, then I've traversed the continent. Funny, I don't feel any different.
A little fuzzier than normal thanks to my now really hairy face, but none the worse for wear.
So the only logical thing to do with your only full day in a far away city after taking four days to get their by train, is to ride another train. So off to Union Station at 8:30 am for a 9:55 am train. I figured I'd eat breakfast in the Metropolitan Lounge since I am in business class and there will be coffee and muffins available there. I took my time getting to the Lounge because I thought I had plenty of time.
I walked in, showed the attendant my ticket and he points to the door and tells me to run after that Red Cap who will take me right to my train, which is boarding. Well, at least there will be coffee and muffins on the train.
The train is not boarding. The train is nowhere near the station. But at least I am at the platform and I got to watch the crew review their paperwork. It's amazing the details that they know well in advance on these trips. I'm not sure I was supposed to be able to watch this, but at least I didn't try to record it or anything so they just let me be. Afterward the conductor explained how the whole crew communicates together so that each knows where the other is, and they are all at their positions at the right times.
Business class guarantees you a seat in the business class car. It does NOT guarantee a good seat in that car. Upon boarding I of course found that all of the forward facing window seats on the right side of the train were taken. I did manage to find a rear-facing seat on the right side so I settled for that. You can't tell from my videos or pictures and I am not going to go so far as to claim that sitting backwards makes me nauseated or anything like that, but given my choice I will always sit facing forward first.
Right after San Juan Capestrano, where the swallows no longer come to roost, the train takes a southward curve and comes right up alongside the ocean. There are houses and parking lots and stuff in the way at first but then it clears up and there's the Pacific Ocean. Right there. The last time I saw the Pacific Ocean in person was in 1983.
Now, according to Wikipedia, in 2009 the swallows failed to return to roost at the Mission at San Juan Capestrano, as they had done for most of human memory. The article says that taller structures constructed north of the town were more suitable to the swallows than the smaller mission building there and so the town lost it's claim to fame and most likely some serious tourist money as well.
Before long you roll into San Clemente Pier station with the famous pier and the beach literally 15 feet from the train. After about an hour and a half of amazing coastal scenery with some mountainous terrain thrown in and a few coastal marshlands for added flavor and I am deposited at Old Town San Diego. I've been told this is an interesting place to kill a few hours before my return trip at 4:30 pm.
I have to say it held my attention. It had a lot of interesting plants for landscaping and the shops were in the style of a pueblo, surrounding an estate of the Estudillo family, accent on every syllable as the tour guide told me. I wandered aimlessly and purchased frivolous things like some hand made glass marbles and a few trinkets for souvenirs and more Jelly-Belly jelly beans that I really need. I had lunch in an open-air restaurant Casa de Reyes, or House of Kings for the Spanish-Impaired. I have to say I've never had a salad that had both mussels and avocado in it, but it was tasty. I wandered around outside of the Old Town area for a while and headed back to the train platform with about 15 minutes to spare.
For some reason, on the return trip to Los Angeles we got a snack pack and a choice of beverage, including wine. We got squat on the San Diego bound trip. Maybe they gave it out already before the train got to my boarding station. Oh well. This would not be the last time that Amtrak did not provide me with food that my ticket purchase included. More on that later.
An absolutely uneventful return trip... my seat mate was an Asian gentlemen who either could not or would not communicate with me and he detrained before San Clemente Pier so I got a forward facing window seat for at least much of the ride. It doesn't take much to make me happy.
For dinner I really didn't want anything heavy so I took my friend Chuck's advice and tried Phillippe, about 1 block from The Metro Plaza. They claim to have invented the French Dipped sandwich. I've never heard of a French Dipped sandwich so I didn't really know what to expect. It was a sandwich. Dipped in gravy. So, basically, a wet sandwich. It was good, I mean, I didn't gag on it or anything, but it was still just basically a wet sandwich. So far my two dinners in Los Angeles have been raw fish and a wet sandwich. I can't wait to get back on the train and have my Amtrak Signature Steak again.
But, will that ever happen? To find out you'll just have to keep reading my blog.
It's been a long day so I did some blogging, reviewed my videos and pics from the day, and called it a night. Tomorrow I have a whole day to kill at Union Station.
Continued on Day 6
Thursday, June 23, 2016
Day 4
Day 4 - aboard the Southwest Chief, number 3, to Los Angeles - I've long-since given up on what calendar day of the week it is.
I opened my eyes and we were not moving. Shocker. Where are we? Why are we not moving? Why is the air conditioning not conditioning my air? There's nothing worse than un-conditioned air and it's getting hot in here. Where did I put my glasses? Oh, yes, in that convenient little mesh thingie Amtrak provides for just this reason... things in trains don't always stay where you put them. Sliding my curtain back slightly revealed we are in Needles, California. Another one of those mythical stops in the middle of the night. Good. We must be really late. We still have at least 8 hours to go. The air comes back on. We start moving again. I roll over and go back to sleep.
The next time I woke up there was no WiFi and my phone has no bars. That's probably because we are in the middle of nowhere. It is 6:15 am, but in what time zone? Pacific is my guess. Ok, then the dining car should be open. There's nothing worse than getting to the dining car expecting to be fed only to be told, "Oh, we're still operating on Mountain Time, it'll be an hour before we start serving breakfast."
This section of the track seems to be pretty smooth. I think I'll attempt a shower. I gather my shower accouterments and make my way downstairs. To the credit of Armona the shower area on our car is clean and not even a little bit disgusting, as they can be if you have a lax attendant. My shower is relaxing and I only nearly got killed once when we slowed suddenly from the speed of light to the speed of sound. Now all pink and wrinkled I head back to my room.
My electric razor broke on the first day and I haven't shaved in 4 days because I keep picturing that scene from Airplane! so my face is starting to look like it's impersonating a hedgehog. And it itches. Man, does it itch! Ladies, you'll never know how much it itches when you start a beard. And the more you scratch it the worse it itches. The only thing you can do is divert your mind from it with something else.
Should I have breakfast or should I just wait until lunchtime in L.A.? I decided that since I did pay for it I might as well eat it, got dressed, brushed the mop on top of my head, brushed my teeth and made my way to the dining car. They don't usually make announcements during what they call "quiet time", between 10:30 pm (ish) and 7:00 am (ish) unless there is an emergency. I found the dining car to be full, but they fit me in and I had my standard on-board breakfast: coffee, O.J., scrambled eggs, hash browns or as they call them, Potatoes O'Brien, bacon and a croissant. This is more food than I would eat for all breakfasts in a week at home. The croissant gets wrapped up in a napkin and stashed in my bag, in case I get the munchies later on during the interminable period that will pass before my next meal.
The train gods must have been smiling on the poor, late, Southwest Chief this morning and we streak across the high desert at realistic speeds for a change... bound for Barstow. When running on schedule, Barstow, California is a 3:44 am station stop. This is a pity because one on the old Harvey Houses is located there, Casa del Desierto, or House of the Desert if you are Spanish-impaired. It's not open but is being refurbished, so perhaps some day... There is also a railroad museum located there. Some neat old rolling stock and a few locos outside, Gaia only knows what's inside, and I am not going to find out, at least not on this trip. A toot of the horn and the "All Aboard!" and I hustle my buttocks back to my room. It is 7:45 as we pull out of Barstow. We are exactly 4 hours late. My lucky day.
About 2 hours later we are approaching San Bernardino. I notice a bank of clouds rolling along at ground level which has the peculiar effect of making it seem like the mountains are floating on top of the clouds. I later learned, thanks to my friend Chuck, that this is due to something called the Marine Layer. Here's how Wikipedia explains it:
A marine layer is an air mass which develops over the surface of a large body of water such as the ocean or large lake in the presence of a temperature inversion. The inversion itself is usually initiated by the cooling effect of the water on the surface layer of an otherwise warm air mass. As it cools, the surface air becomes denser than the warmer air above it, and thus becomes trapped below it.
The result is fog. It's what causes San Francisco's famous fog. And apparently it happens in San Bernardino as well. What I didn't expect was how cool it would be when the train entered that layer, about half an hour after I first noticed it. The fog was sufficient to deposit moisture on the outside of my window. This must be how the plants that live on these mountains manage to survive in a place with a paltry amount of rainfall. After about an hour we emerged back into full Southern California sunlight.
We finally pull into Union Station at 11:55 am. A mere 3 1/2 hours late, thanks to some serious padding built into the schedule. Since I never check luggage when I travel I grab my stuff and head for the exit.
Union Station has to be one of the most amazing stations I've seen so far. Built in what they call the Mission style, it has intricate tile inlaid floors, high vaulted ceilings with ornate wood work and chandeliers that must be 30 ft in diameter. The now defunct Ticketing Room is a sight to behold in and of itself! Nothing that I can say here will do it justice. You can read all about it here.
I am staying at the Metro Plaza hotel, literally across the street from the station, so I make my way in the sweltering heat of the last day of spring, 2016, to my accommodations. I am pleased to find that my room is ready and by 12:15 pm I am safely in my room.
I rested for a while because doing nothing is exhausting. Later in the afternoon, the aforementioned Chuck picked me up (he lives in Long Beach) and we went on a short driving tour of Los Angeles, seeing many of the iconic buildings and bridges we've all seen so many times in movies and TV shows. We decided on sushi for dinner, and I've never had it before. It's not bad. It's more of a texture thing than a flavor thing, I'm convinced, but it's surprisingly satisfying. We walked around in the art district and during our walk, passed through 2 active movie sets. In one of them we walked right through the shot. Chuck says as long as they don't show our faces they can still use the footage, so who knows, we may end up in the background of some movie yet to be released!
Back to the Metro Plaza and off to dreamland. Tomorrow is a busy day!
Continued on Day 5.
Monday, June 20, 2016
Day 3
Day 3 – Aboard the Southwest Chief, number 3, to Los Angeles
I woke up on the third day in a rather peculiar position. No, I hadn’t fallen out of bed during the night, I was in the unusual position of actually WANTING my train to be late. Why on Earth would you WANT your train to be late? Well, I have a hotel waiting for me in Los Angeles. Check in time is 3 pm. The Southwest Chief, IF it arrives on time, will arrive at 8:15 am. That’s a long time to waste so I called ahead and requested early check in. Early means any time after noon, so, still hoping for at least 4 hours late.
I woke up on the third day in a rather peculiar position. No, I hadn’t fallen out of bed during the night, I was in the unusual position of actually WANTING my train to be late. Why on Earth would you WANT your train to be late? Well, I have a hotel waiting for me in Los Angeles. Check in time is 3 pm. The Southwest Chief, IF it arrives on time, will arrive at 8:15 am. That’s a long time to waste so I called ahead and requested early check in. Early means any time after noon, so, still hoping for at least 4 hours late.
The Chief did not disappoint.
Oh, the ride was great. The scenery: unparalleled on any route, Amtrak or
otherwise. It just seemed like, as with the Cardinal the day before wait, what
day is it now? We always seemed to be stopped. Yay.
So as I was saying, I woke up in Garden City, Kansas. Good sign. Garden
City, Kansas is one of those mythical stops in the middle of the night that you
know the train makes but you usually sleep through? You know like, Winnemucca,
NV and Sand Point, ID. Since Armona was so attentive and had started a pot of
coffee in our car the very idea of going back to sleep was out of the question.
Off to the diner car. Breakfast is with Crystal and her daughter Sky. Sky
thinks she’s a monkey and proceeded throughout the meal to demonstrate her
ability to sound “just like a monkey”. Crystal just browsed the internet on her
phone. Granted I may not be the most sparkling personality on the planet but at
least I don’t impersonate primates and I have the class to leave my cell phone
in my room during meals.
Anyway, so we’re in Kansas and I’m eating with hippies
and we’re going something like 1 mph. I mean like literally 1 mph. The
conductor announced, because apparently quiet time had expired at 6:35 am, that
we were creeping along because the BNSF, he pronounced it like a word Binseff,
had done track work last night and we were like literally the 3rd
train to go over it so they wanted to watch us and see if we derailed or
anything and if so, then they’d know they had made a boo boo. Comforting.
Meanwhile, Curious Georgette across the table is trying grapefruit for the
first time. Thus ensued several minutes of gagging sounds, horrific faces,
choking motions and pleas of “get it away from me” in the outside voice of a 3rd
grade girl. On a train. And I haven’t had any of that coffee yet.
It finally comes and it is good. I mean like, really good. Seriously, if
anyone knows what brand of coffee Amtrak serves I’d like to know. It makes the
primate sounds more tolerable. And lo and behold whatever had been mesmerizing
Crystal had apparently lost its luster and she started chatting. Long story
short, which option I wish I had been offered, family reunion. Huge family.
Middle of Arizona. Drinking. Fighting…. Yadda yadda yadda. I’ve said somewhere
else on this blog that you win some and you lose some with dining car partners
and this meal mercifully came to an end, as did our ludicrously slow speed
restriction, and I made my way to shower. Armona had converted my room for
daytime use and I was ready to enjoy the scenery of Colorado and the Raton
pass.
A peculiar thing about train travel and meals is that as you move farther
west you keep getting hours back here and there as you go from one time zone to
the next. This makes the time between meals seem like it is extra-long in some
cases. In east-bound travel the reverse occurs and you keep losing hours. This
makes it seem like every time you turn around they are shoving food down your
throat.
It was a thankfully unremarkable day during which I took hundreds of photos
and at least as many videos. The scenery changed dramatically as we left Kansas
for Colorado becoming much more desert-like. Cactus began to appear along with
the occasional yucca and Joshua Tree.
In La Junta, during a “fresh air break”, I was standing in the parking lot
in a relatively smoke-free zone talking with another rider about the engines on
our train, our backs to the main boulevard running behind us when ‘Wham!’ (I
know, I’ve used “’Wham!’ before but seriously, this was a ‘Wham!’ moment) a car
runs into another car. Air bags deploy. Fluids begin to drip. Other than that,
nothing but the sound of the two locomotives idling behind us. I remember
thinking to myself how time must be standing still for whoever was in that car.
People were moving and getting out of the car on their own power and within
seconds of the actual accident the police arrived on the scene and ambulances
arrived soon thereafter. Our new crew was determined to make up the now 2 plus
hours we were behind schedule so a toot of the horn and the “all aboard!” from
the conductor and we left the poor victims to their own fates. I’m sure they
were ok, but the one car was totaled.
Dinner time. At last. Seems like hours since we ate last. Damned time
zones. Dinner is with George, Ray-Lynn and their granddaughter Hannah who are
traveling to Winslow, Arizona to stay at a restored Harvey House. Google it if
you don’t know what a Harvey House is. This particular one has one of only 3
5-star restaurants in the state of Arizona. Maybe someday I’ll stay at one of
those.
I had pan-seared shrimp cakes with rice and veg. For desert, Amtrak’s
chocolate mousse could induce diabetic coma in a cinder-block, but I decided to
risk it anyway.
After dinner I found the lounge car crammed with the people from the middle
coach which was apparently quite hot and the A/C was not coping with it so I
hightailed it back to my room and just watched the desert drift past my window.
By now it was 7:30 and we were just arriving in Albuquerque. I perused the
Navajo vendors wares on the platform with the folks I’d just eaten with and
took some good pictures, but it was really hot out so I sought shelter back in
my room. As requested, Armona had made my bed up while I ate so I settled in
for the night and enjoyed watching the sun set.
This brings me to another peculiarity of train travel. Sun sets. Going
west, sun sets seem to take forever. Going east, just the reverse. This had not
yet become apparent to me but I did observe to one of the other passengers in
my car that it seemed like the sun takes forever to set here.
A quick check of the Amtrak app told me that we were now 3 hours behind
schedule. Yay.
Friday, June 17, 2016
Day 2
Day 2: Aboard the Cardinal, #51, from Philadelphia 30th Street Station to
Chicago Union Station.
Monday, June 13, 2016
I Woke up and decided that a poorly microwaved breakfast from the so-called
diner was not in my future and decided I’d just grab lunch when I got to
Chicago. I had some coffee and a couple of muffins to hold me over. A quick
check of the Amtrak app showed that we were already 2 ½ hours behind schedule. We had not made Crawfordsville, Indiana yet,
and should have been well beyond that stop by this time. My GPS told me we were
approaching Crawfordsville station. Suddenly, we were not approaching any more.
We weren’t doing much of anything. The
crew on this leg was highly communicative and told us whenever there was a
delay, just what the cause was. In this
case, a BNSF freight train had broken down just ahead of us and was blocking
our path, since it was on a crossing track, and we couldn’t get into the
station at Crawfordsville. The good news
was that a rescue locomotive was on its way to help and would arrive within 20
minutes. Half an hour later the locomotive arrived and hooked onto the 92 car
train to move it off the main line. This took ANOTHER half hour. We are now 3
hours 15 minutes behind schedule when we finally made the station at
Crawfordsville, Indiana.
Now, Amtrak builds “padding” into its schedules, meaning that whereas the
schedule says it will be 45 minutes between 2 stations, it in fact takes only
30. We also gained an hour back as we crossed into Central Time before getting
to Chicago, but this and no amount of padding would allow us to make our
schedule. No amount of high-balling would get us to Chicago by 10:04. My 4 ½ hour
layover was melting away before my very eyes. On the bright side, outside my
window I got to watch a salt train unload its cargo and a front-end loader move
the salt onto a conveyor to add it to the existing salt mountain, referred to
as Mount Morton, the tallest salt mountain in Montgomery county, Indiana. When they unload the salt it has a blue color
added. This quickly washes away. I wonder why they do that.
We finally made it to Crawfordsville and had a few minutes to step off the
train to stretch our legs (mine were already long enough, so I just walked the
length of the platform). At the back of
the train I learned that we had added a private car, the Silver Foot, during
the night at either Indianapolis or Cincinnati, no one seemed to know exactly
where. Private cars are frequently referred to as ‘varnish’ by rail fans. This
is because they are usually in excellent condition and highly polished and they
make the train look nice. They also make a boat-load of money for Amtrak as
they are billed by the mile for the service.
The rate STARTS at $2.75 per mile and goes up depending on other
services they take from Amtrak. The people on the private car do NOT, however,
have access to the train and its amenities, nor do the passengers of the train
have access to the private car.
Nothing further stood in our way for the rest of the trip, but by this time
I was just ready to be in Chicago already. We finally pulled into the station
at 1:45 pm and my layover had shrunk to about 45 minutes. That’s assuming of course that they board the
train at the time the train is due to leave, which they don’t. They board the
train 45 minutes earlier than the scheduled departure time, so my layover ended
up not even being long enough to find a seat in the lounge, let alone take any
pictures at Union Station. But the glass being half full, I decided that at
least I didn’t miss my connection, the closest connection on this whole
journey, and for that I was happy. Many people on my arriving train had missed
their connections and some were off to busses and others were off to hotels for
the night, courtesy of Amtrak, even though it’s seldom Amtrak’s fault when a
train runs late enough that people miss connections. It’s never happened to me,
fingers crossed, but Amtrak is very good when it comes to accommodating
passengers when this happens. I hope I never find out first-hand.
I found my roomette on the Southwest Chief and got settled in. Armona, our Sleeping Car Attendant,
introduced herself and showed me all the amenities… like I needed her to… and
then the Dining Car Attendant came through for dinner reservations. I took an
early seating as I am prone to do on these trips, but also because it was
actually an hour later according to my stomach.
The Southwest Chief pulled out of Union Station precisely on time at
3:00 pm Central time.
The stretch of track between Chicago and Aurora, Illinois is called “The
Racetrack” and for good reason. Trains
go 80mph along this stretch so individuals waiting on the platforms are well
advised to stand behind the yellow line.
The call to dinner came at 5:30 and I made my way to the diner. My partners
for dinner tonight, with apologies for forgetting their names, were heading
home to Kansas City after visiting the east coast. Both were military and it
was fascinating listening to their stories as we streaked across the plains
while the sun made its way to the horizon. The fourth at my table was from
Atlanta, but didn’t share where he was going or why. Oh well, not everyone
enjoys the dining car experience like I do I guess. Dinner was an Amtrak Signature Steak,
medium-rare, with veggies and mashed potatoes.
Done to perfection as usual, it’s my favorite on-board meal. I’d have it
for breakfast if that was a choice. I added a glass of red wine and made it a
great dinner.
Each stop so far had added about 5 minutes to our time, sound familiar? By
the time we made it to Fort Madison, Iowa, the only stop in Iowa, we were about
½ hour late. This being the first “fresh air” break I decided to de-train for a
bit. As I am prone to do on these trips, I walked the length of the platform
and found that the Silver Foot was again with us, and going all the way to Los
Angeles, too. I determined to find out more about this vehicle if I could.
Fresh Air was in quotes because the air is not fresh. The combination of the
locomotive exhaust and the large number of people who still haven’t yet realized
that smoking is going to kill them make for quite the gauntlet for a non-smoker
like me to navigate. BUT, it’s outside and not moving and when you are on a
train for the next 3 days, outside and not moving is a good thing.
After a bit and after the sun had set, we had a situation. The crew made
the announcement that we had a switch ahead of us that was sticking and needed
to be manually thrown and that the conductor “got to do it in the total
darkness, thank you very much”. Our conductor on this route was a bit of a wise
guy but it made his announcements more interesting. Every time he announced a
station stop he threw in a little piece of trivia about the place we were
stopping. He’d clearly been doing this route for some time to know the things
he knew! It took about 45 minutes for
them to throw this switch, get the train across it, switch it back again, and
get the conductor back on board. I just said “Good night, America,” and went to
bed.
Wednesday, June 15, 2016
Day 1
Day 1: Aboard the Cardinal, number 51, from Philadelphia 30th street station to Chicago Union Station. The actual date: Sunday, June 12th, 2016, despite what the date of this post might indicate.
This much-anticipated vacation started off on the right foot when the Cardinal arrived 5 minutes early at 30th Street. This, sadly, was not to be the theme for the rest of this ride. It seems that every station we left we managed to leave at least another 5 or so minutes late. At first I didn't really perceive it and was pretty sure that they would make up the time and get me to Chicago at the scheduled 10:04am the next day, so that I could go and take pictures of the
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| The Staircase at the Grand Hall of Chicago Union Station have seen so many feet that they have been worn down, and need to be replaced for safety reasons. |
In Washington DC they change the locomotive from an electric to a diesel. I don't know the numbers or names or any other specifications of these things because that's just not my thing. All I know is that you need a diesel/electric to go farther south than D.C. on the Northeast Corridor. I was thrilled to learn that we had been pulled by the Vetarans City Sprinter unit. Amtrak number 83 would be our locomotive from here on out.
While we were waiting for our locos to be changed the Carolinian arrived, did it's business and departed. This should have been another warning that we were getting later and later. Of course, that train didn't need to change locos because it already had a diesel/electric for some reason.
The Cardinal Arrives at Washington Union Station
The Cardinal Arrives at Washington Union Station
By the time we got to the New River Gorge, decidedly a highpoint of this route, it was already past sunset. What should have been an amazing ride turned out to be that weird senstation you get when you know you are near something awesome but you are not sure what or where it is... like standing near the rim of the Grand Canyon in the total darkness. By the time we crossed the river at Hawk's Nest it was totally dark out.
Also, by this time, Amtrak had had the opportunity to disappoint me with the food service on the Cardinal. Sadly microwaved dishes from a severely limited menu (See blog page Leg #1 - The Cardinal - Dining Car Menu) to a diner/lounge car being attended by a single overworked man... I felt so sorry for him I severely over-tipped him. Unfortunately, this experiment Amtrak is running with reducing the food service on limited trains such as the Cardinal (a limited train usually does not run daily... the exception being The Capital Limited, which does) shows no sign of ending any time soon. The way I see it, if you expect people to want to take the train you have to give them the basics they expect, and among those are decent food service. I should disclaim that many people on the Facebook Amtrak groups suggest that this is crew-specific and that I shouldn't give the Cardinal a bad rap for one bad experience, but that WAS my experience and I'm not going to sugar-coat my review and that is: I will not ride this route ever again and the food service is the only reason why. Also, the tracks were pretty bad for large stretches of the ride, but that's not Amtrak's fault.
After "dinner" I decided I was going to retire and maybe do some posts to my blog but I had no WiFi service so I just turned in. It was about 10:00 pm or so and I had literally just laid my head on my brand new travel pillow for the first time ever when Wham! (No, not George Michael waking me up before he goes-goes), a really loud bang, hiss of breaks and the train comes to an emergency stop. Total darkness. Power is out. Really scary. We hit something. Don't know what. Would never find out. Waiting in the dark silence for the sound of sirens and flashing lights, but they don't come. But it was enough to make the crew walk the length of the train in the dark examining the train and stuff. I guess they decided that whatever it was we hit was not human and didn't require an ambulance or anything, we were back underway in about an hour. I learned in the morning that whatever it was (they still didn't know for sure) had knocked a hose loose and that had to be emergency repaired to get us to the next station where an Amtrak crew could fix it properly. Finally at about 11:00 or so I was off to sleep and the train was moving. When you are on a train with a short (4 hour) layover window, you like it when the train is moving and you become acutely aware of when it is not. We did a lot of "It is not moving" on this particular leg.
The next such occurrence was in Cincinnati. I suspected when I awoke near 3 am from the train jolting that we were getting a new locomotive. This turned out not to be the case and number 83 was properly repaired and certified safe to take us onward. The next day brought a pleasant surprise and something that's never happened to me before.
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