I'm a bit interested to where people usually spend their time while riding on Amtrak.
I've heard a lot of people just tend to hang out in the lounge car, watching the scenery, while many commuters on the NEC use the quiet car as their sanctuary from people blabbering on their cell phones.
Where do you go?
Tell me if I missed any options...
I kind of laid out a table for our upcoming trip on the westbound California Zephyr (train 5) this September. It gets dark that time of the year about 7:00 PM and gets light around 7:00 AM.
The Zephyr is about a 51 hours train, assuming everything is running on time. --- one partial day, followed by a
full night, then a second,
full day, followed by a second
full night, then a partial day.
So I figure we'll spend about 16 hours sleeping in our bedroom. Add to that the four hours of SSSS time (one hour segments) surrounding the two nights in our room, preparing for bed, and getting up.
We'll also spend about five hours total in the diner for the five meals, and certainly that can vary. We've been known to spend five hours at one meal on the City of New Orleans in the CCC, and that included part of the crew who joined us at our table with guests. :lol:
I also figure about two hours of off-board time to stretch our legs, (read smoking)
at the regular scheduled longer stops.
I think that adds up to 27 hours of "definite" time, leaving 24 hours of "discretionary" time.
Certainly some of the discretionary time will be taken up by getting from one car to another, but I figure that only about 20 of the 51 travel hours will be spent in our bedroom, and 31 hours will be spent elsewhere.
Still, we hold those 20 hours to be ours alone, and our private space.
So finally, that leaves most of the discretionary time (31 hours) in the SSL, mingling with other passengers, and the crew.
We'll probably be sleep deprived by the time we get to EMY.
hboy: :lol: