amamba
Engineer
Well folks, I know many of you were following along in the "EB Lateness" thread, but to recap, I boarded the #8 Empire Builder in Seattle on Monday, July 16th. About 24 hours into our trip we got stopped in Glasgow, Montana due to a freight derailment between Glasgow and Wolf Point. BNSF had 17 cars derailed and there was a fire so big that route 2 was closed for a while.
Approximately 19 hours after we stopped, we began boarding buses around the derailment. We were bused to the westbound #7 which was stopped in Wolf Point. They didn't have enough buses for everyone, so it took until 6:30 PM Mountain time to get all the luggage and people back onto the new #8 (formerly #7), at which point our crew died. We got a new conductor and engineer at around 8 pm and made our way East from Wolf Point. We finally made it into Chicago at 9:30 PM Central time on Thursday, July 19th - a 29.5 hour delay. Luckily the LSL was running late anyway, so I made it onto my originally ticketed train of 448 on July 19th.
They were only offering comp meals to sleeper pax on my first #8 in Glasgow, and we had great meals. However we didn't get lunch on the day of the bus bridge. Then they started feeding half portions of dinner to people as they were feeding all pax for free once we got east of the derailment. Breakfast the following morning was a very sad scrambled egg with a hamburger bun, and lunch was "chicken fricasse" over rice, which must have replaced the dinty moore beef stew as the emergency rations. Dinner on the last night was KFC, and it was a welcome sight.
I put lots more details on my blog which is just too much to copy and post here, so you can all read about it at trainsacrossamerica.blogspot.com.
I am now still heading East on the LSL, having just left Rochester about two hours late. I am in the Boston sleeper and will be detraining in Springfield, where I hope to connect with the 479 to Wallingford, CT at 7:25 PM tonight. The staff on the LSL in the diner is very surly and very slow, which is such a stark contrast to the WONDERFUL staff we had on the EB. At breakfast, I asked our server Miles for more coffee and he didn't even acknowledge the response - although he did bring the coffee pot over. When I thanked him, he grunted in response. What the heck is that about? It seemed like he loathed his job and all of the passengers on the train.
On our first train we had Randy, Daniella & Mary in the diner and they were awesome. On our second train I think we had Joyce and I can't remember the names of the others. I know they were tired and some of them had been working extra days, but they always had a smile on their face and were very kind. Our SCAs on the #8 - first David and then Eric - were phenomenal. I can't say enough good things about the wonderful staff on the EB.
I was feeling kind of grumpy so didn't really get many pictures once we derailed. I just got tired of the whole experience. I am really a roll with the punches type of person so I think that helped, but my husband got pretty grumpy by the end. He especially was not happy with his "gruel" for lunch on the #8 after we had that very sad breakfast. This was his first LD trip, and that is quite unfortunate, because we have reservations for a trip to Florida in November and we might have to cancel and fly. He also greatly prefers the superliner sleeper to the viewliner sleepers, so that is making him a little nervous. He also did not like the LONG walk to the diner from the Boston sleeper on the LSL.
Any questions? I will be happy to answer them. Thanks again to all of the people on this board who helped me along the way. I knew you were all routing for me to make the LSL.
Approximately 19 hours after we stopped, we began boarding buses around the derailment. We were bused to the westbound #7 which was stopped in Wolf Point. They didn't have enough buses for everyone, so it took until 6:30 PM Mountain time to get all the luggage and people back onto the new #8 (formerly #7), at which point our crew died. We got a new conductor and engineer at around 8 pm and made our way East from Wolf Point. We finally made it into Chicago at 9:30 PM Central time on Thursday, July 19th - a 29.5 hour delay. Luckily the LSL was running late anyway, so I made it onto my originally ticketed train of 448 on July 19th.
They were only offering comp meals to sleeper pax on my first #8 in Glasgow, and we had great meals. However we didn't get lunch on the day of the bus bridge. Then they started feeding half portions of dinner to people as they were feeding all pax for free once we got east of the derailment. Breakfast the following morning was a very sad scrambled egg with a hamburger bun, and lunch was "chicken fricasse" over rice, which must have replaced the dinty moore beef stew as the emergency rations. Dinner on the last night was KFC, and it was a welcome sight.
I put lots more details on my blog which is just too much to copy and post here, so you can all read about it at trainsacrossamerica.blogspot.com.
I am now still heading East on the LSL, having just left Rochester about two hours late. I am in the Boston sleeper and will be detraining in Springfield, where I hope to connect with the 479 to Wallingford, CT at 7:25 PM tonight. The staff on the LSL in the diner is very surly and very slow, which is such a stark contrast to the WONDERFUL staff we had on the EB. At breakfast, I asked our server Miles for more coffee and he didn't even acknowledge the response - although he did bring the coffee pot over. When I thanked him, he grunted in response. What the heck is that about? It seemed like he loathed his job and all of the passengers on the train.
On our first train we had Randy, Daniella & Mary in the diner and they were awesome. On our second train I think we had Joyce and I can't remember the names of the others. I know they were tired and some of them had been working extra days, but they always had a smile on their face and were very kind. Our SCAs on the #8 - first David and then Eric - were phenomenal. I can't say enough good things about the wonderful staff on the EB.
I was feeling kind of grumpy so didn't really get many pictures once we derailed. I just got tired of the whole experience. I am really a roll with the punches type of person so I think that helped, but my husband got pretty grumpy by the end. He especially was not happy with his "gruel" for lunch on the #8 after we had that very sad breakfast. This was his first LD trip, and that is quite unfortunate, because we have reservations for a trip to Florida in November and we might have to cancel and fly. He also greatly prefers the superliner sleeper to the viewliner sleepers, so that is making him a little nervous. He also did not like the LONG walk to the diner from the Boston sleeper on the LSL.
Any questions? I will be happy to answer them. Thanks again to all of the people on this board who helped me along the way. I knew you were all routing for me to make the LSL.