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Arrived at the Acela Lounge in DC around 6pm, and it is looking great with fresh furniture, tasteful decor, and TVs not too loud. Excellent food offerings with a half dozen different bars and snack pouches, plus a coffee and espresso machine and a fridge full of juices and sodas. It’s not the...

Metropolitan Lounge Washington DC Am about to board the Regional in coach from Washington DC to Baltimore to catch an O’s game. Used a pass to enter the Metropolitan Lounge at Union Station in DC, which has a sparkling new sign at the door. Inside, the reception desk has lost its COVID-era...

Just purchased roomette for two, Washington DC to Ft Lauderdale on the Silver Star, and back same class on the Meteor, in November to meet a cruise. Had finger poised over the Jet Blue “purchase now” button, waiting for Amtrak’s official announcement of the return to traditional dining...

Latest twist, on the 20 Crescent to New York, in a roomette. Flex meal breakfast was served in a standard bag at 7am with a loud banging on our door. We were still snoozing. No option was provided to have it served at any particular time during a window, as some have described, and as has been...

Our experience: Consist: three coaches, two sleepers, a cafe car, and what looked like maybe a bag-dorm car. Scheduled performance: Remarkable. For most of the trip, we sped merrily along. The train was on time in Baltimore and DC of course, typical in my experience, but then unusually an hour...

Baltimore Pennsylvania Station, scaffolding everywhere outside the old station for a facelift. Led me to look up the plans: New Renderings Released of Future Redevelopment — Baltimore Penn Station That’ll be nice.

CONTINUED: For the southbound journey, we were notified that there was no dining car in the train; it simply wasn’t included in the “consist”. The cafe car was in service for coach passengers, while sleeping car passengers were encouraged to place cafe car orders through their attendant, in our...

Amtrak 19/20, aka “The Crescent”, Washington DC to Tuscaloosa (December 22, on time departure, arrive about an hour and a half late) and return (December 27, about an hour late departure, but arrived nearly on time), two passengers. The car was a Viewliner in a roomette with two bunk beds, a...

What a lovely ride it is between Miami and DC, particularly in the newer sleeper bedrooms. If the cost stays around that of first class air, if full dining service is restored in August as has been rumored, and if a full complement of staff is returned so that there’s one per sleeper plus five...

I’m informed that the mattresses and toppers came with the new sleepers. Would that make these the new more luxurious bedding that I’ve heard Amtrak talking about? If so, oh my, quite uncomfortable. Extremely stiff foam. Tossed and turned all night. Same sheets and pillowcases as on older...

Sneaked photos of the one empty roomette I could find in either of the two new sleepers.

More on the Orlando station. The interior shot is borrowed from @jahancock2001 on Pinterest. The exterior is from the City of Orlando. There’s a lovely write up about the architect at Great American Stations.

Obviously some mechanical structural differences between the new and old sleepers. During the smoke break in Orlando (my goodness, STILL on time...) I snapped shots of the brakes. The brake that has a little tube pointing at it (file name ends in “13”) is from the old car. And doesn’t Orlando...

Rumor: Full-service dining on the Silver Star resumes in August. (Source withheld to protect the guilty.)

Pics of our bedroom compartment.

Hot tip from Preston: The train stops twice in Lakeland Florida as it pulls in and out of Tampa. Hop off the train on the first pass, grab a bite at the restaurants across the street, hop back on the train an hour and a half later!

Sunny in the 70s at 10am, a beach full of chairs but largely empty of people. The crowds on the southern tip of South Beach tend not to wander north to the pricier and more family oriented restaurants of Lincoln Road, not to mention the top end hotels, on the northern part of South Beach. The...

I’ve used the folks out at the airport (Hertz, Avis) and also an outfit in Northport (Enterprise) which is actually quite a bit closer to Amtrak. Uber seems ok, but there aren’t that many drivers at certain times, so you could get stuck (like I did recently in Birmingham). If you instead book...

We dropped off our rental at the Enterprise in Northport, and within minutes they arranged a drop for us to the train station. Very friendly, great customer service, thank you Enterprise. As my first dose Pfizer hasn’t yet kicked in, we stood outside the station to wait for the Crescent 20...

I suspect you’re right. One day’s problem does not make a trend. I’m certainly prepared to give Birmingham Uber another chance. Actually, on our Crescent today, there is just a cafe car, no dining car. Cheers!