jis (01/12/83)
>From: j.mukerji >Date: Wed Jan 12 14:35:59 1983 I spent two weeks during Christmas traveling around the United States by Amtrak. The routes that I travelled are: New York - Chicago 41 Broadway Limited Chicago - Seattle 7 The Empire Builder Seattle - San Jose 11 The Coast Starlight San Jose - Los Angeles 11 The Coast Starlight Los Angeles - Tucson 2 The Sunset Limited Tucson - Chicago 22 The Eagle Chicago - New York 48 The Lake Shore Limited Service on the Broadway and the Lake Shore have improved considerably since the last time I was on these trains two years back. The new Amfleet II equipment are a definite improvement over the heritage fleet (and even the Amfleet equipment). Conrail tracks remain as they were, good to indefferent. Amtrak tracks in the Northeast Corridor have improved considerably with the introduction of Concrete crossties and continuously welded rails. The Empire Builder remains my favourite for friendly co-travellers and crew. The Milwaukee Road tracks are quite bad at places between Chicago and Minneapolis. Burlington Northern tracks from there to Seattle are almost uniformly good to excellent. This train runs along the old Great Northern route through Marias Pass (Glacier National Park), and Stevens Pass (the 8 mile long Cascade Tunnel). The scenery in this area was breathtaking, specially since the area had just received 4 feet of snow the previous night! The Coast Starlight was the most crowded of all the trains. On both days all seats on the train were taken. The folks on the train were more lively (sometimes boistrous) than on other trains. On both the runs there were several guys with guitars and wonderful voices who entertained the rest of us in the Lounge/Cafe Car most of the time. This was two days before Christmas, so everybody was in a festive mood. The stretch along the Oakland Bay between Martinez and Oakland was quite pretty in spite of occasional views of various effects of pollution. The run from San Jose to LA is one of the most breathtaking train journeys that I have ever taken. The Salinas Valley, the numerous switchbacks through the Cuesta Pass down to San Luis Obispo, and then along the seacoast, almost touching the waves for 120 miles, through Santa Barbara and Oxnard to LA, a highly reccommended train journey. The view through the 4' X 6' windows of the observation lounge adds significantly to the experience that one gets travelling down highway 101 which parallels the railroad, (which followed the old El Camino Real) almost all the way. LA to Tucson was mostly through night, so no comments about the scenery. Tucson to El Paso was during daylight. A lot of desert of the Sonoran and the Chihuahuan variety. The Rio Grande at El Paso was anything but "Grande". It is a small stream that one can cross by merely taking off ones boots! El Paso to San Antonio was at night again. At San Antonio the Sunset Limited drops off the Chicago cars and proceeds on to New Orleans. The Chicago cars are added onto the Eagle which starts three hours later, enough time for the more adventurous to take a walk to the nearby Denny's for brekfast, and a walk around downtown(?). >From San Antonio it is through Fort Worth and Dallas into Arkansas at Texarkana. We celebrated New Year on the train between Malverne and Little Rock. At Little Rock a deluge of 70 passengers joined us, filling each and every available seat on the train. After a hundred mile run along the Mississippi River early in the morning, we arrived at Saint Louis at dawn. After picking up three more cars there we proceeded to Chicago on the old GM&O track of ICG (boy was that bad! you could hardly stand up!). The Eagle has the unique feature of being operated over the tracks of the largest number of railroads (SP, MOPAC, MKT, AT&SF, and ICG). On the whole it was a great experience,and I would do it again, perhaps over a slightly different route the next time. As for expense, I used a Chicago to Chicago Circle Ticket which cost me $485 by coach, and a New York - Chicago - New York Excursion Ticket (~$160). If any of you out there would like to know more about train travel in this country or in Canada, I would be perfectly willing to help you with info. If any of you have any suggestions for me please send mail. Jishnu Mukerji American Bell Inc. HO 1B-425 {vax135,harpo,allegra}!hocsd!jis