All aboard!

Be advised that this is going to be an unusually long post, since the train trip has been so long …

3-31-14 „Natural wonders“

6:30 am - Getting up and ready to bring our three heavy pieces of luggage across the street to the AMTRAK station for check-in (2 pieces per person are free). The train is supposed to be on time, even early. Back to the hotel, check-out and pickup of hand luggage.

The train arrives at 7:30 am and we were let into our car and to our „Roomette“, rather a „cell“ than a „room“. Sleeping compartments are larger and more comfortable but cost about double the price. Glad, that we have some experience in storing luggage in the meantime. There are problems with the restrooms and showers in this car which were repaired at the station by the chief conductor himself.

8:20 am - „All aboard“ - for a 2226 mi trip. The 9-car-train departs Tucson and starts crawling through the dessert, passing some large fields with solar panels. Haven’t seen many before, though one would assume that they are very effective in a hot state like AZ. Breakfast is still being served and is - as all meals are - included in the ticket of sleeping car passengers; also coffee, juices and water are always available in the alleyway. Haven’t been in the mood for scrambled eggs or pancakes, prefered our own grapefruit and oranges brought over from Scottsdale.

10 am - Crawling by Dragoon Mountains, through Willcox Dry Lake & Bombing Range, the flat sandy bottom of a former lake used as a military training ground now. Lunch reservations being taken (there are time slots you can choose from).

11 am - Getting close to the New Mexico border. A couple of nut plantations to be seen on the way. Pretty flat and boring landscape. Time change to Mountain Time (MT).




Noon - lunch in the dining room. Several choices, e.g. sandwich, burger, salad, soup etc. Burger was o.k. Still crossing the southern part of NM, which is everything else but densely populated. No cacti anymore, but tumbleweed and low bushes and shrubs. Sitting in the sightseeing car to enjoy a better view and a little more legroom.

4 pm - Approaching El Paso/NM, passing a huge new freight train terminal. Mexican border runs directly alongside the train treck and the mexican settlements look pretty depressing, poor and dirty. Crossing the Rio Grande into Texas before our short stop in El Paso, famous for its bootmakers and other producers. Train had to make up for a delay of approx. 40 min. There was some emergency in the dining car, somebody fell and paramedics embarked the train in El Paso. Apparently all is fine now.

We have taken the „Sunset Limited“ from L.A. to New Orleans once in the early 1990s. Our current train (running three times a week) is a combination of Sunset Limited and Texas Eagle. In San Antonio the train will be separated: part of it goes to New Orleans, ours as the „Texas Eagle“ to Chicago.

Always liked train travel and even planned a book about train travel in the U.S.A. It’s mostly elderly couples, black people, mexican families, military personel and students on the train. One young lady is moving to TX by train with her kid and mother, one black guy attended a funeral in L.A. and the train trip was cheaper than a flight on short notice, another elderly couple from California didn’t want to take a plane to visit relatives in Oklahoma. Another advantage of train traveling is that more luggage can be transported.

5 pm - Dinner reservations being taken. The electric outlet in our compartment doesn’t work. Got admission by the conductor to sit in an empty sleeping compartment (much more comfortable than ours) to reload the laptop. In the meantime (6:45 pm) our outlet is working again, our neighbor’s isn’t. Passing through yellow-brownish wide flat grassland of Western Texas now. Seeing groups of wild mustangs from time to time. Sun is about to set. Imagine: it takes the train about 30 hours just to pass through Texas, from El Paso to Texarkana.

7 pm - Dinner service was veeeery slow, much too few waiters and all a bit unorganized. We got our entrées at 8 pm and weren’t even asked about a ice tea refill or dessert. We had salad and a roll, then a small steak with baked potato and veggies (regular price: $ 25!) and beef short ribs in a peppery sauce with mashed potatoes and veggies.

Train stopped in Alpine/TX at 7:45 pm (8:45 CT) - on time. Have been there last spring when we toured Big Bend NP. Alpine is the birthplace of Dan Blocker (Hoss) of „Bonanza“, a quaint college town with a a vivid artists’ community. We’re now on Central Time, pretty confusing. Arizona did have Mountain Time but no Daylight Saving Time, then MT with DST and now we are on CT.

10 pm (CT) - When we got back from dinner our beds were made and it was hard to get something out of our bags. Pretty tight in our cell. Not sure yet who’ll climb up to the top …

4-1-14 - „CityTrip“

6 am - An alarm sound in our „cell“ got us fully awake, after some hustling and bustling since our arrival to San Antonio at 5 am. Power was switched off and then suddenly the alarm went off. Night hasn’t been too good anyway, just very few hours of sleep. Pretty sticky in the cell, plus a hard, narrow mattress.

7 am - Eventually a mechanic showed up but couldn’t do anything, the whistling alarm sound continued. So, we had to move all our luggage to another compartment. We gave no thought about going back to sleep. Train left San Antonio on time, now as the „Texas Eagle“, and we just passed the rodeo grounds and remembered when we attended this great event about four years ago. Gray skies and green trees now, some cattle. Thanks to a new talkative conductor we got to know that the train is "being hosted" on the trecks of other companies like Burlington Northern Santa Fe or Union Pacific.

9:30 am – Austin/TX - what a tiny little station building for the capital of Texas! Our new car attendant Simon is much more approachable than Lisa was before. Talking to him and with other guests, we noticed that there were more problems on the train (one guy was placed in the wrong part of the train, some A/C didn’t work, there was a bag mix-up…) and started to laugh about it. Also, we got to know that though the interior of the cars is updated, they are at least 30 years old. No wonder that always something needs repair!

10:30 am – Taylor/TX, famous for one of the best BBQ places in the whole state: Taylor Café. Our conductor makes announcements where we are and what’s special, which is nice. Train rather empty, flat landscape, fields and cattle pastures, much denser population. In total not really fascinating.

11:30 am - Temple/TX : large historic railroad station with a worth seeing collection of old cars and locomotives.

noon - Sausage on a pretzel roll for lunch, didn’t like it, should have taken the burger instead. Rough trecks now, very shaky ride. Green, but pretty monotonous landscape. We are at the front of the train since San Antonio, not at the tail anymore. Dining and lounge car are much closer. More and more oil pumps emerging, the landscape gets dryer and less green.

2:30 pm - Arrival Fort Worth - warm and humid. About 20 min. stay, but no internet around the station - getting uneasy.

3:30 pm - Dallas, station in the center of downtown. Simon, our young afroamerican-carribean car attendant, told us that he is „on call“ with AMTRAK and after a 48-hour-break he will have to jump on one of the four outgoing trains in Chicago, his hometown, whenever needed. Strenuous job, but he is laughing most of the time and pampering old and not so old ladies.

6:30 pm - Still in Texas. Took a nap after having labeled a couple of hundred of pictures. Still about 80 deg. F and high humidity, but Simon is always teasing us by updating us on the current Chicago temps, which is cruelsome. Swampy, woody green landscape.

6:45 pm - Marshall/TX - a magnificent historic station building, „Old South“ architecture and waiting passengers look like arisen from a scene of „Gone with the Wind“.

8:30 pm - Back from dinner. I took the turkey shank, the daily special, whereas P. was on the safe side to choose steak again. I could need a schnaps now. Bed is made and we are approaching Texarkana, our last stop in Texas, bordering Arkansas and Louisiana. Pitch-dark outside.

4-2-14 - Rain and boredom

7 am - Standing in the outskirts of St. Louis. Freight Trains ahead of us which move slowly. Many. Have been on time up to this point, but now trecks are jammed. The further we came to the East the worse trecks became. Slept with a couple of intermissions, train was honking all the time in the denser populated areas, but at least no alarm or other accidents. Rain outside.

8:30 am - Arrival to St. Louis, departure at 9 am, one hour delayed. The fifth conductor is now in service, again, a talkative guy.
In St. Louis, called „Gateway to the West“, the Lewis & Clark expedition - a military corps commissioned by president Jefferson - started its operation to explore the then unknown West. Meriweather Lewis recruited people (scouts etc.) in St. Louis and got provisions and boats before they started their adventure in spring 1804 nearby at the confluence of the Missouri and Mississippi River. Underneith the famous St. Louis Arch there is an interesting historic museum explaining everything about the Lewis & Clark expedition. When we did research for the Lewis&Clark Bicentennial 2003-2006 we even were allowed to see some of the original pages of L&C’s diary in the archives of that museum.
BTW, we scretched another U.S. State from our list: Arkansas. Our criterium is that we’ve at least slept for one night in a state to „have been there“. Now it’s just 7 U.S. States left on our bucket list: Kentucky, West Virginia, Alaska, Hawaii (the latter should be done next), and – we have been there but not overnight – New Jersey, Iowa and Delaware.

9:30 am - Leaving Missouri for Illinois. Alton is our first stop, followed by some similarly undistinctive stops on the way. Pouring rain now.

11 am - Ready with picture labeling. A passenger, a musician from Austin, is entertaining people in the Sightseer Lounge with Americana/Bluegrass music. Wished they would be offering more „entertainment“ on the train (like videos, music or similar).

11:15 am - Illinois’ State Capital Springfield, „Home of Abraham Lincoln“. We just passed F.L. Wright’s Dana-Thomas House, an architectural beauty accomplished in 1908 and saw the fantastic building of the Abe Lincoln Presidential Center in the distance.

Noon - Last meal on the train: Angus Burger. We’vee been hungry since we didn’t eat breakfast. Met with a couple from Indiana (South Bend) visiting their daughter and grandson in Temple/TX. They didn’t want to fly, though they had to change train in Chicago again.
Since Springfield we are mostly following the old course of Historic Rte. 66. There are constantly problems with the „governing railroads“, delay is adding up to over 2 hours by now and it seems to take forever to get into Chicago.

4 pm: Arrival in Chicago with a 2-hour delay. Finally. No snow, even a bit of sun, but considerably cooler. Baggage claim takes another 30 min.