SUTTONK11
Train Attendant
Before starting my trip report on the Coast Starlight there are a few things I would like to mention as they may be of benefit to future travelers.
First of all, my wife and I disembarked the Empire Builder in Seattle and immediately boarded Holland America's ship the Westerdam for a 7 day Alaskan inland passage cruise which included 3 cities in Alaska, 1 city in Canada and 1 entire day cruising Glacier Bay. This is a great trip with scenery that cannot be described with words and/or pictures; scenery on a parallel with the likes of the Grand Canyon, Victoria Falls or anything else that comes to mind. This is a must do if one has the time, we actually booked our cruise first and then the train to and from the ship with other stops along the way.
NOTE: Cruises have gotten as bad if not worse than the airlines in trying to nickle and dime their passengers to death; you literally cannot leave your cabin without someone trying to sell you something you don't need or being charged for something that use to be included. I use this as a lead in to my feeling that Amtrak need not pursue this route and should instead upgrade both the quality and the price of first class travel. People like to know approximately what the cost of a vacation is before going in order to be able to plan and, let's face it, what difference does $5 for a wine tasting make to someone spending around a $1000 for a first class ticket?
Secondly, we spent 3 days in Seattle on our return from Alaska and did all the things one is suppose to do including the Space Needle, Pikes Place Market, museums, etc.; Seattle is a very beautiful city and well worth a stay if you have never been there. My recommendations for anyone visiting Seattle are to stay at the Inn at the Market, have at least one meal at Etta's Resaurant and take the Underground Seattle Tour which is not only very informative but also very entertaining.
Back to the old unattractive train station in Seattle to catch the Coast Starlight. We arrive with plenty of time to spare which turns out to be a good thing as the baggage check men had decided that this was the day to show how important they were. We had two bags to check and, as one would expect since we don't travel with portable scales, one bag was 3 lbs. overweight and the other 7 lbs. underweight - not bad I thought. Well it wasn't close enough for these two guys who, after giving us a lecture on how that extra 3 lbs. might hurt their backs, made us unpack both of our bags on the floor and repack them so they both were within the limit. I should mention that this was the official launch day for the "new" Coast Starlight and everyone else was making every effort to make it a special event except these two goodwill ambassadors for Amtrak. Having spent time in the military system where I saw plenty of these little people who have some power without any idea of how to use it and knowing anything I said would more than likely make things worse, I just bit my lip, did as requested and got on the train.
While this train was as nice as any we had ridden, if it was new or newly refurbished, I'm glad I didn't ride the old one! The lounge car was quite nice and comfortable with a movie theater, cafe and, believe it or not, it was for first class passengers only. The new limited menu cafe provided my wife and I an opportunity to have lunch by ourselves which we enjoyed very much. The salads we had were delicious and, even though the service was very, very slow, it was nice to not have to worry about making conversation with strangers for a change. We then settled into our bedroom and watched some of the most beautiful scenery I have ever seen until it was time for dinner.
David and Darlene from San Francisco were our tablemates for dinner. He was a recently retired from the railroad and very familiar with the mudslide that had the CS virtually shut down for months. He had actually been a part of the repair operation in the beginning and was now traveling back through it as a civilian to see how it had turned out. It was interesting to hear all about what happened from someone that really knew and have him point out different things as we traveled through the still ongoing repairs. As for dinner itself, I still think that the chicken is the best choice day in and day out closely followed by the flat iron steak which can be tough occassionally.
We awoke the next morning at 8:00 after a very sound sleep, had a good breakfast in the dining car and went to the parlor car to sightsee. The scenery was spectacular with the stretch between Paso Robles and San Luis Obispo being the prettiest we had seen until we rounded a bend and there was the Pacific ocean! The beauty of the cliffs, rock formations, beaches and surf are impossible to describe but I must encourage anyone that has the opportunity to take this trip on the CS to do it; it's a great train and a ride so scenic you will never forget it.
We arrived 2 hours late into Los Angeles, got off the train and headed up the ramp to the baggage claim area when my wife remembered that she had left her pocketbook in our bedroom so she ran back to retrieve it. A total of maybe 10 minutes elapsed before she got back to our bedroom but it was too late. The pocketbook was gone and the attendant said that the electricians were the only ones on the train after arrival and had probably stolen it!! It was midnight before we finished filling out all the forms with the railroad police and got to our hotel. We never heard another word about the pocketbook from Amtrak, the police or anyone else which I thought was a little odd for service business - I would certainly think that someone at Amtrak would monitor theft and other reports filed by passengers and at least acknowledge them thereby giving the impression that they care.
We checked out of the hotel around 8:00 the next morning and rented a car for our drive to the Grand Canyon; this was an earlier decision of mine in planning this trip which was made based on Amtrak's 4:20 AM arrival time in Williams Junction, AZ. We had bought a package from the Grand Canyon Railroad which included a hotel room and dinner that we would miss because of the late arrival, not to mention being woren out for your first day there because of having to get up at 3:30 in the morning. We also would have had to spend the day in L.A. which we had no desire to do. I cancelled our $411.00 roomette on Amtrak, rented a car for $126.00, payed approximately $90.00 in gas and $60.00 for a taxi from Flagstaff to Williams ( there are no car rental companies in Williams ) for a net savings of around $100.00. Not only did we save money and arrive at our hotel in Williams at 5:00 PM instead of 4:20 the next morning, we throughly enjoyed the drive through the Mojave as well as a break from the train travel.
STAY TUNED - THE SOUTHWEST CHIEF COMING NEXT
First of all, my wife and I disembarked the Empire Builder in Seattle and immediately boarded Holland America's ship the Westerdam for a 7 day Alaskan inland passage cruise which included 3 cities in Alaska, 1 city in Canada and 1 entire day cruising Glacier Bay. This is a great trip with scenery that cannot be described with words and/or pictures; scenery on a parallel with the likes of the Grand Canyon, Victoria Falls or anything else that comes to mind. This is a must do if one has the time, we actually booked our cruise first and then the train to and from the ship with other stops along the way.
NOTE: Cruises have gotten as bad if not worse than the airlines in trying to nickle and dime their passengers to death; you literally cannot leave your cabin without someone trying to sell you something you don't need or being charged for something that use to be included. I use this as a lead in to my feeling that Amtrak need not pursue this route and should instead upgrade both the quality and the price of first class travel. People like to know approximately what the cost of a vacation is before going in order to be able to plan and, let's face it, what difference does $5 for a wine tasting make to someone spending around a $1000 for a first class ticket?
Secondly, we spent 3 days in Seattle on our return from Alaska and did all the things one is suppose to do including the Space Needle, Pikes Place Market, museums, etc.; Seattle is a very beautiful city and well worth a stay if you have never been there. My recommendations for anyone visiting Seattle are to stay at the Inn at the Market, have at least one meal at Etta's Resaurant and take the Underground Seattle Tour which is not only very informative but also very entertaining.
Back to the old unattractive train station in Seattle to catch the Coast Starlight. We arrive with plenty of time to spare which turns out to be a good thing as the baggage check men had decided that this was the day to show how important they were. We had two bags to check and, as one would expect since we don't travel with portable scales, one bag was 3 lbs. overweight and the other 7 lbs. underweight - not bad I thought. Well it wasn't close enough for these two guys who, after giving us a lecture on how that extra 3 lbs. might hurt their backs, made us unpack both of our bags on the floor and repack them so they both were within the limit. I should mention that this was the official launch day for the "new" Coast Starlight and everyone else was making every effort to make it a special event except these two goodwill ambassadors for Amtrak. Having spent time in the military system where I saw plenty of these little people who have some power without any idea of how to use it and knowing anything I said would more than likely make things worse, I just bit my lip, did as requested and got on the train.
While this train was as nice as any we had ridden, if it was new or newly refurbished, I'm glad I didn't ride the old one! The lounge car was quite nice and comfortable with a movie theater, cafe and, believe it or not, it was for first class passengers only. The new limited menu cafe provided my wife and I an opportunity to have lunch by ourselves which we enjoyed very much. The salads we had were delicious and, even though the service was very, very slow, it was nice to not have to worry about making conversation with strangers for a change. We then settled into our bedroom and watched some of the most beautiful scenery I have ever seen until it was time for dinner.
David and Darlene from San Francisco were our tablemates for dinner. He was a recently retired from the railroad and very familiar with the mudslide that had the CS virtually shut down for months. He had actually been a part of the repair operation in the beginning and was now traveling back through it as a civilian to see how it had turned out. It was interesting to hear all about what happened from someone that really knew and have him point out different things as we traveled through the still ongoing repairs. As for dinner itself, I still think that the chicken is the best choice day in and day out closely followed by the flat iron steak which can be tough occassionally.
We awoke the next morning at 8:00 after a very sound sleep, had a good breakfast in the dining car and went to the parlor car to sightsee. The scenery was spectacular with the stretch between Paso Robles and San Luis Obispo being the prettiest we had seen until we rounded a bend and there was the Pacific ocean! The beauty of the cliffs, rock formations, beaches and surf are impossible to describe but I must encourage anyone that has the opportunity to take this trip on the CS to do it; it's a great train and a ride so scenic you will never forget it.
We arrived 2 hours late into Los Angeles, got off the train and headed up the ramp to the baggage claim area when my wife remembered that she had left her pocketbook in our bedroom so she ran back to retrieve it. A total of maybe 10 minutes elapsed before she got back to our bedroom but it was too late. The pocketbook was gone and the attendant said that the electricians were the only ones on the train after arrival and had probably stolen it!! It was midnight before we finished filling out all the forms with the railroad police and got to our hotel. We never heard another word about the pocketbook from Amtrak, the police or anyone else which I thought was a little odd for service business - I would certainly think that someone at Amtrak would monitor theft and other reports filed by passengers and at least acknowledge them thereby giving the impression that they care.
We checked out of the hotel around 8:00 the next morning and rented a car for our drive to the Grand Canyon; this was an earlier decision of mine in planning this trip which was made based on Amtrak's 4:20 AM arrival time in Williams Junction, AZ. We had bought a package from the Grand Canyon Railroad which included a hotel room and dinner that we would miss because of the late arrival, not to mention being woren out for your first day there because of having to get up at 3:30 in the morning. We also would have had to spend the day in L.A. which we had no desire to do. I cancelled our $411.00 roomette on Amtrak, rented a car for $126.00, payed approximately $90.00 in gas and $60.00 for a taxi from Flagstaff to Williams ( there are no car rental companies in Williams ) for a net savings of around $100.00. Not only did we save money and arrive at our hotel in Williams at 5:00 PM instead of 4:20 the next morning, we throughly enjoyed the drive through the Mojave as well as a break from the train travel.
STAY TUNED - THE SOUTHWEST CHIEF COMING NEXT
