Your one, true, stand-out Amtrak memory

[RobertF]

What is the one, big, stand-out memory that you have had while riding Amtrak?

Mine might sound odd, but it was on the CZ .... We had boarded the train in SLC and

were heading to Chicago. The train had already passed through Denver.

It was late at night and I was riding in a bedroom with my two boys.

I was still awake.... watching the train as it moved along the middle of no-where.

Suddenly, the train comes to a halt, power goes out and it's totally silent. Looking outside, there was a full moon

and you could see that you were just out in the middle of nowhere... farm land and us.

One might expect a UFO to appear as out in the middle of nowhere that we were.

Since it was late, it was very quiet. I could hear the door of the car open as the someone exited the car.

One or two others passed with flashlights, heading to the rear of the train. I just sat there,

enjoying the silence.

After a while power came back up, and then we were highballing again. The attendent later told me that they had

thrown an air hose.

Maybe it sounds weird, but that just stands out in my head for some reason.

 

[mercedeslove]

I was riding the TE back from LA to CHi. There was a guy in coach who had a desktop computer, yes a desktop computer hooked up and a 20in flat screen monitor. He had to works, it was a bit silly. Sucked to be him though because they had to bus us from Del Rio to fort worth and he had to deal with all that poop

 

[Steve4031]

I would say that it was my first from Galesburg to San Francisco on the San Francisco Zephyr back in the early 70's I was 8, and was traveling with my family. The highlights for me were riding in the dome car across Iowa, watching the signals change as we passed them. In Denver, they added a full length dome car. While they did the required switching, My mom, my sister, and I were waiting in the vestibule for my Dad to return from the station with a paper. I thought Dad was being left, but the porter explained about the switching. He kept the top half of the dutch door open while the switching maneuvers were completed. Of course yours truly had his head out the window watching the proceedings. Later that day we were riding in the dome car as we crossed Wyoming and saw a tornado off in the distance. The last day of the trip we crossed the Sierra nevada mountains. I can still remember my first trip around Stanfords curve just west of Truckee.

This trip sticks with me because it was my first experience to the wonders of long distance train travel.

 

[MrFSS]

I will never forget being on an Acela from Providence to Boston on the morning of the original 9/11. We were on vacation and had planed to spend the day seeing the sights in Boston and then the train back to Providence. By the time we got off at south station, half of Boston was trying to get out of town. We had to ride the commuter train back south and never made it out of the station. Maybe we'll make it again, someday.

 

[The Metropolitan]

Lots of vignettes standing out here (gazing at the Bannerman "Castle" while riding along the Hudson when young, somehow taking the Crescent locally from BAL to NYP as a child by myself, being amazed at running down the middle of the street in Ashland, VA as a teen) but unfortunately, my most vivid Amtrak memory was my Weekly Specials ride back from Chicago last February aboard the Cardinal that was more negative than positive.

The water lines kept freezing, and we were over 5 hours late leaving Chicago. As a result, we rode through places like Cincinatti and Kentucky (scheduled in the gloom of night) in broad daylight. For some reason, we sat at Huntington for over an hour without explanation, and just made it into the snowy New River Gorge as the evening light began to fade. Finally, the aggrivations of the trip were starting to seem like they were worth it.

Then we came into Hinton, WV and the power crapped out. We coasted down to a siding about 5 minutes down the line, and again lacking any explanation, we sat in the darkened coach as the light outside faded to black, only occasionally hearing something hitting the undercarriage of the coach. Needless to say, the experience frazzled a lot of nerves. On this particular day, we had a fair share of displaced riders from a cancelled Lake Shore Limited who were taking this train all the way to Penn Station New York.

Finally, we got going, and never looked back from there, as I tried a second night of sleep in the Amfleet II. Our arrival into Baltimore was scheduled to be 738pm, but was more like 419am the next morning. On our arrival, the Solari Board in the station had already shown the departure of the next day's 338am train, yet our lowly Cardinal of the previous evening was still up there, simply resigning to show "DELAYED."

Somewhere in the Travelogues section, I have a little recap of this most interesting trip with photos.

 

[the_traveler]

A few years ago, I was on the LSL from CHI-BOS. (This was when the LSL was on the old earlier schedule.) I woke up in the morning and the train was moving VERY slow, and then stopped about 15 minutes later in a freight yard. After being stopped for a long time, I decided to go for breakfast. I then learned that our #2 loco was not running right and had to be taken off. But before they cold do that, because the crew died (hours of work limits), they had to bring in a new crew.

So we sat - and sat - and sat - and sat - ...!

We were sitting for so long, that I could have had breakfast AND lunch IN THE SAME PLACE! (I was going coach, s I usually skip lunch.)

Normally (at that time) the LSL was the 1st train to NYP from BUF. However, that day it was the last!

We finally arrived in BOS around 3 AM!

 

[p&sr]

What is the one, big, stand-out memory that you have had while riding Amtrak?

My first long-distance trip, California to Boston in August of 2004. Riding the Lake Shore Limited across Ohio into my third consecutive overnight in Coach. After dinner, watching a movie in the Lounge Car. The movie was set in Hawaii. Every few seconds, it was interrupted by a brilliant flash of lightning from the raging thunderstorm outside.

 

[p&sr]

What is the one, big, stand-out memory that you have had while riding Amtrak?

Does VIA-Rail count? That memory would be May of 2006, riding the Canadian from Toronto to Vancouver BC. Third overnight on the train, tired of cramped seating in Coach. Sleeping upstairs in the Dome car (ice cold) while passing through the Rocky Mountains in the dark. (And looking forward to their excellent breakfast in the morning.)

 

[Green Maned Lion]

It was a good long while ago. We were riding a Silver Service train, I think it was the Meteor. We were in an old Slumbercoach, a double roomette. I was with my dad. I think I remember the consist being 2 F40s, Baggage, Dorm, 10-6, 10-6, 24-8, Buffet-Diner, Amlounge, 5 Amcoach, Lounge, 10-6. Long train, not like the tiny things we have now. Anyway, we're going along at a nice clip and I'm looking out the window, my dad gets up to go get some coffee or something. Then I hear, barely (we are, remember, 5 cars back!) the engineer leaning on the horn, and the distinct sound of the train going into emergancy. I hear a "whoa" followed by a "THUD", and look right to see my dad on the floor in the hallway (he was fine, by the way) and then left again to see a truck-tracter and half a trailer doing 360s out the window.

I remember the whole thing extremely vividly, although I am not sure why.

 

[transit54]

On one memorable occasion, the conductor of the Vermonter came on the PA system and told us that the crew had a tradition on the train was to read several passages of poetry on each trip from a Vermont author. I remember rolling through the state, looking at the mountains and the scenery, listening to two selected passages of poetry that the conductor had selected. It really added an incredible character to the train that just was unlike any other form of travel. I was so pleased that after the trip I wrote Amtrak a letter commending the crew and the entire experience.

 

[had8ley]

I guess the wackiest trip was on Silver Service in the late nineties. We made it all the way from Rocky Mount to DC with one engine. (Yes, the bean counters ran one unit trains that far back.) About a mile from Penn Station our electric engine burned up and they sent a yard engine to pull us in. All this while we sat in almost total darkness, except for emergency lighting, and you could hear a pin drop two car lengths away. The switchman wanted to make a walking brake test because I heard him tell the other switchman, "This will take all day." I pulled out my cell phone and pretended to dial a number and spoke into space, "Hello!, this is VP Larsen from the NS. I'll be late for that important meeting with the president of Amtrak because a switchman wants to spend the day in the Hudson tunnel." We were on our way in less than 5 minutes.

 

[Rail Freak]

What is the one, big, stand-out memory that you have had while riding Amtrak?


One might expect a UFO to appear as out in the middle of nowhere that we were.

Since it was late, it was very quiet. I could hear the door of the car open as the someone exited the car.

One or two others passed with flashlights, heading to the rear of the train. I just sat there,

enjoying the silence.

After a while power came back up, and then we were highballing again. The attendent later told me that they had

thrown an air hose.

Maybe it sounds weird, but that just stands out in my head for some reason.

WOW, I can't believe someone had the foresight to bring Highball Ingediants in case of a situation like that,LOL!

 

[WhoozOn1st]

Big standout memory? Easy!

Rolling out of the Rockies onto the plains of Montana aboard the eastbound Empire Builder (Portland section).

I confess to being a speedfreak, and the EB's extended high-speed running was a major thrill. You don't get that in California. And since the Portland section was tacked to the end, I could stand for hours and watch the scenery and the tracks roll away behind from the end of the last car.

 

[Amtrak OBS Gone Freight]

Two particular trips come to mind. I was working both of them of course. First was the "24 hour late train #97 Silver Meteor trip from hell." What made this trip so hard is we (the OBS crew) are already tired from the trip up on train #98 as we used to turn in NYP as #97 the same day. We left NYP pretty close to ontime, and it went downhill before we ever got to PHL. I think I wrote about this trip in another thread somewhere, so for the short story this trip was one that vitually everything that COULD have gone wrong DID! The second day of travel was the actual day we were supposed to arrive in MIA. We arrived on the third night into MIA at exactly the time we supposed to hit the bumper the night before! A day late, but on time! IIRC that afternoon's #89 (the one that left the next morning out of NYP which got screwed up too) pulled in right next to us on the outbound track about thirty minutes later with the one of other two trains having to terminate up the road in order to get things back in sync. The trains were still late for the next couple of days until equipment got back in place even after terminating one train!

The next one was another SB trip on the "Silver Palm," train #89. It was one of those trips that went absolutley perfect on train #92 coming North, and it had started out perfect going home on #89. It was also one of those trips that you "just know" something is gonna happen, too! And we made through the night, woke up the next morning, and were still ontime. We backed into TPA to make our station stop, and the power went down while we were serving breakfast in the diner! I didn't think anything of it until about twenty minutes had past, and then I started to get concerned. Both units were dead as dead could be! They couldn't get either unit to crank up. So we sat there in TPA at Union Station for a good five hours (yes that's right... five hours), and right before they were going to bustitute the passengers for the rest of the trip they were able to get the second unit running. But they had to take the engines to turn them on the wye, and switch the second unit to be in the lead. That working unit this time lost traction when it got up to the wye, so they dispatched a freight loco to power us into MIA. Fortunately, the Genesis still had the ability to generate HEP for the train, so everyone was overall comfortable in the FL heat even though agrivated about the now ten hour delay! I do know some TPA passengers (who boarded earlier) had already disembarked and drove to their destinations! We pulled into MIA on the outbound track right next to train #97 who had left in the evening from NYP on the same day we did! And that is not a very good feeling to leave NYP and pass a crew/train heading NB (who left on the morning after us) in the NEC. To pull into MIA next to that same crew who had arrived back in MIA just about an hour sooner! Great trip, but it went to hell in FL!

I would have caught another horrible trip had I not marked off for a doctors appointment. That was that last kinda famous "Silver Meteor" trip (if anyone remembers) where they spent about thirty hours in the South Ga woods because of a derailment near SAV that New Years or shortly thereafter!

OBS gone freight...

 

[Mark]

I was about 14 or so and had made the retun trip from Tucson AZ, (where my Grandma lived), via the SSL/Inter-American/Eagle/Texas Eagle with my parents and brothers several times. My Step-Dad, (who is also a mild train-buff), would get us kids the schedules so we could track the OTP of the trains. Well, we were always late in to San Antonio on the SSL portion but I always had hope for an 'on-time' arrivial. My Step-Dad would tease us in the diner, 'don't worry we're still late' or something like that when we got antsy to check our schedules, (we didn't bring them to dinner). I would stay up as late as I could watching the crews work and tracking the train. I awoke to my Step-Dad poking me, "Come on Mark, were almost there." I don't really recall the conversation of course but I asked him what time it was and he said it was almost 530A, (back then the SSL was scheduled for a 518A arrival at San Antonio to connect with the IA/E/TE and yes I just looked it up in my 1979 timetable, though this was probably 1980 or 81). That meant we were only about 15 minutes late! Victory! We were lining up down the stairs of the High-level coach when I, now fully awake told my brother the good news. My step dad over heard me and said, "Not bad, not bad at all but we're still late." He said it smiling and in a way that made me know he was impressed too. It was the first time I was in San Antonio that early and saw the Ringling Brothers Circus Train pass the station about an hour or so after we arrived, (my Step-Dad had us go out and 'make sure' our luggage got off loaded). Back then they bussed the passengers across town to catch the northbound IA/E/TE. I made that trip seven or eight times with my parents and loved every one.

 

[Steve4031]

2 more favorite memories.

The first was a trip on the Cardinal back in the early 90's from NYP to Chicago. I was booked in a slumbercoach. I came down the escalator at Penn and took a look at the train and did not see the distinctive window pattern of the slumbercoach, and had a sinking feeling. I was sure it had been bad ordered, and I was going to be in coach. I showed my ticket to the attendant standing next to a 10-6 sleeper, and he pointed to the last car on the train, another 10-6 sleeper. I was unsure, but my ticket number matched with a roomette, and all was well. Obviously, this had been going on for a while.

This was a great ride. I spent many miles at the back window watching the tracks as we highballed down the corridor. I enjoyed the ride over the Susquehanna and Gunpowder rivers. The rest of the day I enjoyed the mountains of Virginia and west Virginia. We were ontime into Chicago.

The 2nd was my trip on a 10 hour late 58. I have a nice trip report on that one in the trip report section. I dont know how to do links though.

 

[p&sr]

Great stories, everybody. Reminds me of the New Year's Day Flood of 1996-1997. My wife and I were riding the Coast Starlight for the full trip, from Los Angeles to Seattle (round trip), departing on New Year's Eve. With a Roomette! Unprecedented! Great scenery along the Southern California Coast. Rainy in the Salinas Valley. Downpours of rain in the Bay Area. And exceptionally heavy rains after midnight in the Sacramento Valley. Whole areas of countryside were submerged. Rivers were raging torrents, overflowing their banks. I watched closely out the window to monitor our progress.

Then I said, "We've seen that River before! Somehow we're crossing the same River again."

It turned out to be true. Quietly, with no announcements, we had made a U-Turn and were heading back to Sacramento... where those boarding there were ushered back off the train. Then through Davis (same story)... hoping we might find some other route north? Then finally across the Bridge from Benicia to Martinez, and I knew the trip could not be recovered. We parked in the yards at Emeryville, much to the surprise of all the Passengers come daybreak (New Year's Day).

Amtrak offered to fly us to Seattle, but we declined. We knew there were no southbound trains from there due to ice storms and mudslides, so it would have been a one-way trip for us.

Instead, we rode the next (and last) Corridor Train back to Martinez. Going through Berkeley the tracks were underwater in places. Approaching Martinez they were under a foot or two of water for the last half-mile, so we proceeded at a walking pace into the Station with a track inspector walking just ahead of the train.

This was before the new Inter-modal Station was built. The Station then was a small single room in an old and not-very-sturdy wooden building. We waited inside, and it was explained that no more trains could run that day because of the flooding. Then the creek overflowed and came down the main street, surrounding the depot and making it into a little island.

Then the water crept inside the depot, and we all put our feet up onto the chairs to stay dry. Finally there was about eight inches of water inside the depot, and the Amtrak Rescue Bus finally arrived (driving through the floods to get to us). We led the way for the others, showing them how to walk barefoot out through the front doors to protect everybody's shoes, and wading on out through two-foot deep running water over the sidewalk on the way to the bus.

The bus was able to back up onto higher ground, and safely exited the area. Working more like a limousine, they dropped off all of the passengers at various appropriate locations, often with doorstep service. We were home by mid-day and ready for a good hot shower to get all of that mud off of us.

Our tickets were marked "off at Martinez", and we turned them in for a refund on the unused section of the journey. It turned out that the tracks and bridges had washed out in multiple places, blocking EVERY rail route in or out of Northern California for the next couple of months!

Memorable indeed...

 

[RailFanLNK]

Feburary 2006, was 1 week away from riding Amtrak for the first time. I decided to go down to our station at midnight and "see the train". I had always seen them "fly by" but never up close. As I and my travelling companion stood around looking at the train, it had been reported that it was 20 minutes early. A man with a "funky" hat called out from the CZ, "are you boarding tonight?" And we replied, "no we are boarding next week!" And then he looked at his watch and smiled and said, "do you know your a week early?!" :lol: He then stepped down from the HUGE Superliner (in our thoughts) and asked us "where you going to next week?" And we replied, "San Francisco!" He said, "how come you travelling with Amtrak?" And I said, "cuz I have had one too many airline trips from Hell!" And then he fires back....."did you know Amtrak has trips to hell too!" :lol: And we began to laugh! He told us "don't expect to be on time" and said, "the trains are worn down, NOT dirty, but we perform minor miracles every day with what fiscal means we have". We then told him we were in a bedroom and was wondering if we should change to a roomette, it would have saved us $700, he said, "hop on, I will show you around!" We said, "can you do that?!?" And he tilted his head down, pointed at the Conductor's hat and said, "I"m in charge of this baby, please be quiet, but I will show you quickly what an Amtrak train looks like!" That was the BEST PR anyone has done for Amtrak! He set us straight, got us really excited, gave us tips and was just a gem! The best thing? He was the conductor the following Friday so we got to enjoy his personality and professionalism! I will never forget that!

 

[eee]

I've never ridden anywhere outside of the CDL-CHI corridor, and I've only ridden the City of New Orleans on one of those trips. We almost always rode the Illini due to better schedules and cheaper fares. When I was 12 I began riding the train by myself between CDL and CHI, where I'd catch a Metra to Elgin.

But my best memory was one of those times when I was riding by myself, on the Illini southbound near Kankakee. I was listening to my walkman radio to pass the time. The City of New Orleans song came on some local radio station. That was the first time I'd ever heard that song or even heard of that song, and I heard it while riding the same rails that the City of New Orleans traversed. I really pinpoint that as the time my love for trains began to blossom.

 

[Falco]

My first long distance trip was coincidentally, the last northbound Coast Starlight service on Jan 23rd,

Just outside of Santa Barbra, passing by the miles of uninhabited beach, we crossed over a river and a sand island was in the middle and just as we passed over it a flock of birds took off from it.

But the most memorable moment was on the "substitute" CS southbound (on Jan 28th),

I had to watch the sun go across the ocean and do this:



A quiet calm ride back.

I must say, after riding in those superliner cars, it kicks airline travel right in the groin.

 

[jackal]

I don't know that I have one single true stand-out memory, but since there was a ~15-year gap between my first LD trip and my recent (last August) LD trip CLT-CHI-CLT and there wasn't anything particularly memorable about the last one (good trip, I just slept through all the scenery!), my fond memories are mostly of that earlier trip.

When I was about eight or nine (give or take a couple of years), my mom and I rode the Coast Starlight SLO-SEA-SPK-PDX-SLO. Now, my childhood home literally backed up to the SP mainline in the tiny town of Templeton, just five miles south of Paso Robles. The PRB station did not exist at that time, so we drove down to SLO to board the train.

A couple hours later, after we passed over Cuesta Grade and sped through Atascadero, we highballed by my old house at 55mph--but our close family friend's entire family was in our back yard--the same place I spent hours of my childhood watching Amtraks and SP freights--with a huge poster that said, "We love you, [Mom] and [jackal]!"

Considering that was 15-16 (or so) years ago and I was so young, I'm surprised I remember much of that trip at all, but here are a few more spotty memories:

-Waking up at San Jose Diridon in the middle of the night (not sure why I remember that, but...)

-Odell Lake in the Oregon Cascades and a tour guide or car attendant in the Sightseer telling us it was one of the deepest lakes in the world at 2,000' deep (a claim I was never able to substantiate, but it still sticks in my memory)

-Speeding through the Willamette Valley parallel to I-5 (probably fostered my love of high-speed railroading and racing cars in the train)

-Also in the Willamette Valley, I remember the Trails 'n' Rails ladies coming on to do their presentation. On the later southbound trip, it was the same lady, and I told her such (I don't think she really remembered me, but...)

-Snapshots going through the north Cascades on the eastbound EB between SEA and SPK--tunnels and half-tunnels (sorry, I forget what they're called--where you can see out the "wall" of one side of the tunnel) through the lush green mountains

-Returning from SPK, crossing the highbridge over Hangman Creek, which has a switch in the middle of it (claimed by someone on board to be the only bridge with a switch in the middle of it...not sure if that can be substantiated, either) which splits the SEA section's route from the PDX section's route

-Snapshots along the Columbia Gorge

The fond memories of that trip (even though we traveled coach the whole way! ) have instilled and will continue to instill a love of train travel in me.

 

[gswager]

On my first Amtrak trip from Salt Lake City to Emeryville, CA on California Zephyr, I was in sightseer lounge looking out the window at Donner Lake in the summer. My mind was running about those immigrants who were trapped for the whole winter, forcing some to cannabilizing. It's a major contrast between the frontier trailblazing the young US while we have a huge comfort with rails, roads, etc.

 

[jis]

My most unusual memory on an Amtrak train is on the Silver Star. We had left Orlando and been on the road about 20 minutes or so. We were doing about 35mph and going around a curve, when there is intense blowing of the whistle, followed by a thud and dropping of air, and as I looked out the window of my Viewliner Roomette a smashed up Honda Civic landed right next to my window, its front end totally mushed up, a furious dog barking inside it and as it landed the airbag deployed and pinned the driver in his position! It was pretty obvious what had happened. Police, Fire and Rescue came within minutes. Fortunately no serious injuries. The train was released within 40 minutes. As we started rolling again I went off to the Diner a bit shaken to treat myself to a hearty steak dinner.

The same train as it arrived in Jacksonville was cordoned off by local homeland security types. Apparently someone had called in suspicious activity that indicated to them that 6 terrorists were preparing to blow up the train or some such. So the train was evacuated and the dogs were sent in to look for bombs. The dogs and their minders had a heck of a time getting the dogs to sniff luggage up in the luggage racks, so they apparently gave up after several hours. They decided to detach the last car of the train and keep it to investigate and sniff it at leisure and released the rest of the train about 6 hours after we arrived in JAX. Meanwhile Amtrak and the local Police department were gracious enough to buy Donuts and Coffee from a Dunkin Donuts down the road so we could all feast on Donuts and Coffee in the middle of the night while we waited. Surprisingly the train did not lose any more time and made it into New York just about six and a half hours behind schedule.

 

[jim55]

I've had many but one that stands out was the South West Chief detour from Kansas City to Amarillo to Abo Canyon to Belen, NM, a WYE and a back in to Albuquerque. This was due to heavy snow in Western Kansas and SE Colorado. After years of railfanning the SW transcon it was quite a thrill to ride the rails and see the many photo locations I used to frequent. Amarillo was special in that we passed the former Air Force Base where many years ago I trained to fly the T-38 out of Reese AFB. US route 60 right next to the tracks from Amarillo to almost Belen, Clovis, Ft Sumner, Vaughn and the neat "Abo Canyon". I stayed in Abq and rented a car and drove back to Abo for some ground shots on the subsequent SWCs. It just went by to quickly. Jim

 

[transit54]

Seeing as this thread has shifted to more stories about when things went wrong, I'll add this one:

I was on the SB Vermonter once and was north of Brattleboro when the train stopped, not near any station. The NECR is very good about letting Amtrak through, so I figued it wasn't an issue with freight traffic. We sat there for about five minutes before it was announced that a tree had fallen in our path and was blocking the tracks. The conductor said it would be a while before they could find anyone to come out and cut it up, but he was willing to let us out of the train so that we could see for ourselves what the problem was. So many of us climbed out onto the track and sure enough, there was a sizable tree about thirty feet in front of the train. However, a utility crew passing by happened to notice the stopped train and was nice enough to cut the tree up in a matter of minutes and have us on our way. All in all, we only took about a 45 minute delay, then we were on our way.