DC-NYC Trip Log: The First Night
When I decided to blog about my tr, I wasn't sure how much Internet I was able to connect to. I have Clear Wireless router, which I knew would allow me to access the Internet on the go, but not all the time. When I first field-tested Clear on an Amtrak train while going to Galesburg for annanov's graduation, I was disappointed to discover that the signal cut out pretty much the second we left the western edges of Chicagoland. So, to borrow my mom's saying I so often quote, I hoped for the best and prepared for the worse.
I was honestly surprised where the signal work and where it didn't. It was fuzzy on Chicago's South Side. It worked fairly steadily as we went through the industrial Calumet region, in the Indiana cities of Whiting, Hammond and East Chicago. It stopped working at Gary, only to suddenly kick in at South Bend-Mishawaka area, then flicker out until we reached Elkhart - and then it stopped working again and wouldn't work for the rest of the day. This meant I was able to get some tweets and Facebook status updates out while I was traveling, but some got lost because the signal cut out and they lost relevance by the time it kicked in again.
I started this entry while I was still in Chicago. I hoped to post it before the night was over, but the signal cut out at Elkhart before I could. And so, it will go up whenever I get a good signal.
Arriving at the Chicago Union Station
I left my apartment way ahead of time, which turned out to be a good thing. The 'L' train stopped several times, and if I left a little closer to departure, it might have meant I wouldn't make it. But as it was, I made it to the Chicago Union Station with an hour to spare.
In what has become something of a tradition for the trips involving afternoon/evening trains, I grabbed an Italian Sausage sandwich and some fries at the station's Gold Coast Hot Dogs branch. As I ate, I was reminded of two things - Italian sausage sandwich that hasn't been dipped loses a lot of flavor, and the Gold Coast Hot Dog fries are delicious. Probably unhealthy as heck, but delicious.
As per another old tradition of mine, I went to the Great Hall to seat for a few minutes before heading to the boarding area. There is something about sitting where five generations of train travelers seats, looking at the same walls and staring up at the same roof as they sat. And the architecture is always pretty impressive. This time, the view was ruined a bit by the advertising tent right next to the entrance... But I reminded myself that Amtrak gets money out of this, so I tried my best to ignore it while i sat.
The boarding area wasn't quite as packed as I expected, but it was by no means empty. Partially because people already started lining up to board Capitol Limited. A few minutes later, the line grew long enough to twist around boarding area walls, snake-like, all the way to the end of the hall people entered through. I got there by 6:10 PM, and it wasn't long before the line was moving.
On the train
As we walked up to the train, I thought to myself - oh, I know the drill. The conductors would ask us where we're going, and that will determine which train car we go on. But when I got ready to step inside, something unexpected happened. The conductor handed me a slip of paper, and told me it was a seat number.
On all the long-distance trains I've ridden, the seating is usually on first-arrive, first-seat basis. In other words, they put you in the first seat that's available, and unless you're traveling with a family or a group, you don't get much choice in the matter. There was no way to know for sure if I would end up at a window seat or an aisle seat, or which side I ended up on, until I actually got inside. But this time, with a seat number, I knew exactly what seat I would end up with.
I got seated next to a magician who was going to Washington DC on business. We chatted amicably enough, but it soon became clear that he didn't feel like chatting all that much. More than anything, I was relieved that it wasn't a repeat of a terrible Grouchy Seathog experience from my trip to New York City.
When the conductor went around checking tickets, another thing caught me off guard. In all the trips I've taken before, when a conductor checks the tickets, he or she attaches what I've dubbed "destination slip" - a slip of paper with the station code written on it. It lets conductors keep track of who is getting off where and which seats might be available for passengers who get on later. But there were no destination slips this time. No idea why.
Another thing that caught me off guard was the fact that the train offered dinner. I figured since Capitol Limited left Chicago at 6:40 PM, it would be too late to start dinner. But soon after we left Union Station, we got a message from the dining car attendant, saying that she was going to walk around collecting reservations, and that passengers will be able to reserve spots for any point between 7:00 PM - 9:00 PM.
I didn't buy the dinner. I ate at Union Station, and even if I didn't - as I said before, part of me can't help but balk at paying over $15 for a single course. A meal, maybe, but a single course?
Since my seat neighbor wasn't that terribly chatty, I went over to the lounge car as soon as the conductor finished checking tickets. And when I went downstairs to grab a cup of tea from the cafe (another Strannik Amtrak Tradition), I was in for another surprise.
On this train, the cafe level of the lounge car was designed a bit differently than I was used to. On all the Superliners I've taken before, all the food was behind the counter. Here, there was no counter. Instead, the entire space was turned into a small room, with a smaller counter off on the side. The food items were placed in lockers along the walls. Passengers need to take an item - or items - and bring them to the cafe attendant and pay. And lest you think this makes it easier for people to just grab staff and ran, the sales space is positioned right near the entrance. The cafe attendant can just step out and block the way in seconds.
The cafe spaces I was used to had regular tables with couch-like seats. This cafe had those - but it also had more booth-like set-up further back. I like it. If you're traveling with a family, it's actually a pretty nice set-up.
By the time we were in Gary, the train was moving at a fairly impressive speed. I couldn't access Amtrak train tracker, so I wouldn't be able to tell you how fast, but it felt as fast as Southwest Chief when it got a chance to accelerate at near-speed limit on the way to Galesburg. It swayed quite noticeably - nothing you wouldn't expect with Amtrak trains, but between the speed and the swaying, Capitol Limited felt like a train unleashed. A lot of the times, Amtrak trains have to slow down, and it was almost as if the train was relishing a chance to race near its full potential.
(Not full potential, mind you. Amtrak trains can, theoretically, accelerate up to 90 miles per hour. They just aren't allowed to, for safety reasons.)
Even though it was my second time speeding through northwest Indiana on an Amtrak train at night, I was struck by just how dark it was outside when we were going through the farmland. Just utterly pitch black. You can't make out a single thing other than an occasional speck of light. When we passed though a village, or even a city like LaPorte, the sudden presence of light startled me. It doesn't help that, with everything outside shrouded in darkness, I had no way to orient myself.
I kept checking my cellphone, waiting for the clock to flip to Eastern time. As you may remember, when I visited the dividing line between Central and Eastern time, my cellphone's clock kept flipping back and forth. But it didn't. Not even when we stopped at South Bend, which was definitely on Eastern time. I had to turn the phone off and on to get it reset. Of course, this is a different model phone, but... If I didn't turn it off and on, I could have ridden all the way to Washington D.C. with my phone clock, my computer clock and my watch on Central time.
By the time we reached South Bend, we were running half an hour late.
As we made our way past Mishawaka, the dining car was taking in its final passengers. A family was helping the grandmother get to the car - the grandson holding her hands and the father ready to catch her right behind her, while the mom gave directions. It was very sweet, actually.
After 9:00 PM, just before the dining car closed, passengers who didn't have reservations were invited to come in for desert. Not free desert, but it was still a nice gesture.
I stayed up until 10:00 PM (11:00 PM local time). When I went back to my seat, I saw that my seatmate relocated to the row behind me. For some reason, the family that reserved a room on a sleeper car wound up placed in a coach car. Once the crew figured out the mix-up, it moved the family to the sleeper - which meant that there were two free rows. So long the train didn't need more seats due to passengers coming on, my seatmate was free to move to one of the freed-up rows. Which meant I had my row all to myself.
As I went to sleep, the train pulled up to a stop in a small town of Waterloo, Indiana. I saw a girl with a pink backpack getting out of the train and walking briskly toward the nearest intersection. And I couldn't help but wonder - what was her story? If it were a Friday, I would've figured she was a college student going home for the weekend, but it was a Wednesday. What brought a girl with a backpack on a small town in the middle of a week?
And, with that thought, I drifted off into a light sleep.
I was honestly surprised where the signal work and where it didn't. It was fuzzy on Chicago's South Side. It worked fairly steadily as we went through the industrial Calumet region, in the Indiana cities of Whiting, Hammond and East Chicago. It stopped working at Gary, only to suddenly kick in at South Bend-Mishawaka area, then flicker out until we reached Elkhart - and then it stopped working again and wouldn't work for the rest of the day. This meant I was able to get some tweets and Facebook status updates out while I was traveling, but some got lost because the signal cut out and they lost relevance by the time it kicked in again.
I started this entry while I was still in Chicago. I hoped to post it before the night was over, but the signal cut out at Elkhart before I could. And so, it will go up whenever I get a good signal.
Arriving at the Chicago Union Station
I left my apartment way ahead of time, which turned out to be a good thing. The 'L' train stopped several times, and if I left a little closer to departure, it might have meant I wouldn't make it. But as it was, I made it to the Chicago Union Station with an hour to spare.
In what has become something of a tradition for the trips involving afternoon/evening trains, I grabbed an Italian Sausage sandwich and some fries at the station's Gold Coast Hot Dogs branch. As I ate, I was reminded of two things - Italian sausage sandwich that hasn't been dipped loses a lot of flavor, and the Gold Coast Hot Dog fries are delicious. Probably unhealthy as heck, but delicious.
As per another old tradition of mine, I went to the Great Hall to seat for a few minutes before heading to the boarding area. There is something about sitting where five generations of train travelers seats, looking at the same walls and staring up at the same roof as they sat. And the architecture is always pretty impressive. This time, the view was ruined a bit by the advertising tent right next to the entrance... But I reminded myself that Amtrak gets money out of this, so I tried my best to ignore it while i sat.
The boarding area wasn't quite as packed as I expected, but it was by no means empty. Partially because people already started lining up to board Capitol Limited. A few minutes later, the line grew long enough to twist around boarding area walls, snake-like, all the way to the end of the hall people entered through. I got there by 6:10 PM, and it wasn't long before the line was moving.
On the train
As we walked up to the train, I thought to myself - oh, I know the drill. The conductors would ask us where we're going, and that will determine which train car we go on. But when I got ready to step inside, something unexpected happened. The conductor handed me a slip of paper, and told me it was a seat number.
On all the long-distance trains I've ridden, the seating is usually on first-arrive, first-seat basis. In other words, they put you in the first seat that's available, and unless you're traveling with a family or a group, you don't get much choice in the matter. There was no way to know for sure if I would end up at a window seat or an aisle seat, or which side I ended up on, until I actually got inside. But this time, with a seat number, I knew exactly what seat I would end up with.
I got seated next to a magician who was going to Washington DC on business. We chatted amicably enough, but it soon became clear that he didn't feel like chatting all that much. More than anything, I was relieved that it wasn't a repeat of a terrible Grouchy Seathog experience from my trip to New York City.
When the conductor went around checking tickets, another thing caught me off guard. In all the trips I've taken before, when a conductor checks the tickets, he or she attaches what I've dubbed "destination slip" - a slip of paper with the station code written on it. It lets conductors keep track of who is getting off where and which seats might be available for passengers who get on later. But there were no destination slips this time. No idea why.
Another thing that caught me off guard was the fact that the train offered dinner. I figured since Capitol Limited left Chicago at 6:40 PM, it would be too late to start dinner. But soon after we left Union Station, we got a message from the dining car attendant, saying that she was going to walk around collecting reservations, and that passengers will be able to reserve spots for any point between 7:00 PM - 9:00 PM.
I didn't buy the dinner. I ate at Union Station, and even if I didn't - as I said before, part of me can't help but balk at paying over $15 for a single course. A meal, maybe, but a single course?
Since my seat neighbor wasn't that terribly chatty, I went over to the lounge car as soon as the conductor finished checking tickets. And when I went downstairs to grab a cup of tea from the cafe (another Strannik Amtrak Tradition), I was in for another surprise.
On this train, the cafe level of the lounge car was designed a bit differently than I was used to. On all the Superliners I've taken before, all the food was behind the counter. Here, there was no counter. Instead, the entire space was turned into a small room, with a smaller counter off on the side. The food items were placed in lockers along the walls. Passengers need to take an item - or items - and bring them to the cafe attendant and pay. And lest you think this makes it easier for people to just grab staff and ran, the sales space is positioned right near the entrance. The cafe attendant can just step out and block the way in seconds.
The cafe spaces I was used to had regular tables with couch-like seats. This cafe had those - but it also had more booth-like set-up further back. I like it. If you're traveling with a family, it's actually a pretty nice set-up.
By the time we were in Gary, the train was moving at a fairly impressive speed. I couldn't access Amtrak train tracker, so I wouldn't be able to tell you how fast, but it felt as fast as Southwest Chief when it got a chance to accelerate at near-speed limit on the way to Galesburg. It swayed quite noticeably - nothing you wouldn't expect with Amtrak trains, but between the speed and the swaying, Capitol Limited felt like a train unleashed. A lot of the times, Amtrak trains have to slow down, and it was almost as if the train was relishing a chance to race near its full potential.
(Not full potential, mind you. Amtrak trains can, theoretically, accelerate up to 90 miles per hour. They just aren't allowed to, for safety reasons.)
Even though it was my second time speeding through northwest Indiana on an Amtrak train at night, I was struck by just how dark it was outside when we were going through the farmland. Just utterly pitch black. You can't make out a single thing other than an occasional speck of light. When we passed though a village, or even a city like LaPorte, the sudden presence of light startled me. It doesn't help that, with everything outside shrouded in darkness, I had no way to orient myself.
I kept checking my cellphone, waiting for the clock to flip to Eastern time. As you may remember, when I visited the dividing line between Central and Eastern time, my cellphone's clock kept flipping back and forth. But it didn't. Not even when we stopped at South Bend, which was definitely on Eastern time. I had to turn the phone off and on to get it reset. Of course, this is a different model phone, but... If I didn't turn it off and on, I could have ridden all the way to Washington D.C. with my phone clock, my computer clock and my watch on Central time.
By the time we reached South Bend, we were running half an hour late.
As we made our way past Mishawaka, the dining car was taking in its final passengers. A family was helping the grandmother get to the car - the grandson holding her hands and the father ready to catch her right behind her, while the mom gave directions. It was very sweet, actually.
After 9:00 PM, just before the dining car closed, passengers who didn't have reservations were invited to come in for desert. Not free desert, but it was still a nice gesture.
I stayed up until 10:00 PM (11:00 PM local time). When I went back to my seat, I saw that my seatmate relocated to the row behind me. For some reason, the family that reserved a room on a sleeper car wound up placed in a coach car. Once the crew figured out the mix-up, it moved the family to the sleeper - which meant that there were two free rows. So long the train didn't need more seats due to passengers coming on, my seatmate was free to move to one of the freed-up rows. Which meant I had my row all to myself.
As I went to sleep, the train pulled up to a stop in a small town of Waterloo, Indiana. I saw a girl with a pink backpack getting out of the train and walking briskly toward the nearest intersection. And I couldn't help but wonder - what was her story? If it were a Friday, I would've figured she was a college student going home for the weekend, but it was a Wednesday. What brought a girl with a backpack on a small town in the middle of a week?
And, with that thought, I drifted off into a light sleep.