CONduit: The Adventure Continues
Friday, June 4th, 2004 11:28 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rolanniThe further adventures of Amtrak Train #49, Car 25117, Lake Shore Limited
Tuesday, May 25, 2004
The train rolled into Cleveland Station at 7:10 a.m., four hours behind schedule. Luckily, our connection to Salt Lake City doesn't leave Chicago Union Station until 2 p.m. We may make it. If we're close, says one of the attendants, they'll hold the train
for us. If we're not, Amtrak will put us up in a hotel and put us on the next train going our way. If that happens, we'll miss the library gig Thursday night. Urp.
But that's the future. In the past...
Around about 10 p.m. last night, Crew Chief Bob Schmidt discovered that Steve and I were going all the way to Chicago and moved us down to seats 23 and 24, mid-car. Once in our new digs, we had a glass of wine. Bob Schmidt stopped by to chat a bit and tell us about one of the conductors, who writes horror. Duty called eventually, Steve dozed while I had at Merry Gentry. It had been an adrenaline filled day and I was still somewhat wired.
The train quieted down by bits and pieces as people put their cellphones away, and settled in to sleep. At last, mine was the only light on. Steve slept fitfully and I didn't even want to try, but at last Merry wore me out and I nodded off. Sleep, as I say, was broken -- broken most thoroughly by a longish stop sometime in the early single digit hours. We looked, but there was only darkness outside the windows -- no station, no city, nobody on the road, if road there was – no stars.
Good ol' #49 at last got underway again. A crew member came by, saw we were awake and stopped to let us know that the train had run over a railway tie that had been left in the middle of the track. The conductors had removed it and the train was now moving
on. Which it did at a good clip. We both dozed off again, my head on Steve's shoulder, letting the train rock us to sleep.
And woke up to silence, the train once again motionless and nothing outside the windows but black night and the occasional headlight glare from a truck on the distant road. This was around 2:30 a.m., after we'd been stopped for awhile. It was too still and my back hurt from being crammed in the seat at a weird angle, so I straightened up, turned on the light and got back with Merry. My goodness, what adventures that girl has.
Steve woke up and we talked a little, low-voiced. One of the passengers across the aisle woke up and started folding papers, first loading her CD player and slipping the buttons into her ears. The guy in the seat behind me had a nightmare, kicked the back of my chair repeatedly, snorted awake, shifted position and went back to sleep.
We saw dawn bleach the edge of the sky a little after four, and at 5:30 a.m., the train started to move again.
The story from another crew member: The tie had in actuality been a pile of ties, which had splintered when the forward engine caught them up and though the conductors had removed the larger pieces, they had missed several which had gotten up into the workings and the wheel wells. In addition, the cowcatcher had been deformed by the impact and displayed a worrisome tendency to catch on the track. Concerned that we might derail, the conductors called ahead to CSX, which sent a crew down to weld the damaged cow catcher. The forward engine, with its compliment of splinters, was powered down and the back-up engine brought on line. Its now pulling the cars and pushing the forward locomotive, ever nearer to Chicago, bold heart.
The cafe car opened at 6:30 a.m. and breakfast was a microwaved bagel with cream cheese for me, an apple muffin for Steve and strong railroad coffee all around.
This train has been ill-wished from the beginning of the trip, according to Bob Schmidt, who naturally doesn't put it that way. There is, for instance, no dining car for the first class passengers and them others what're eager to pay five-star prices for two-star food. When they were putting the train set together at the yard in New York, the dining car was found to be defective in some way, and so it was "shopped." However, no other dining car was available, so a second café car was added, back near the sleepers, and stocked with frozen Stouffer's dinners, and that's what first class had for dinner. We did better, I'm thinking, with the d'angelo's sub that we packed in.
It's 7:40 a.m. and we're at the Elyria, Ohio station as I type. The schedule says we should've been here at 3:27 a.m.
This is going to be interesting.
Straying for a moment from the theme of disasters, the day outside my window is pleasant: slightly overcast and misty over Lake Erie as we rumbled through Cleveland. The marinas are so tight with watercraft you could walk from one end to the other, stepping from deck to deck. The Donald Z. Nelson was at dock being loaded with sand, or ore, or coal. A lone sailboat was out beyond the breakwater, sails full of wind. All of the water we've passed over or run by has been brown, and running swift, frothy with yesterday's rains. There are standing puddles in fields and yards, some patronized by a few puzzled but game Canada geese.
One of the joys of traveling by train is the lovely rolling greenness of the passing countryside. One of the horrors is seeing first hand how very much junk there is in this world. Man is the animal that clutters and leaves without cleaning up after himself.
Steve is dozing again. Me, I think I'll stare at the window a bit and then open the sample chapter file.
* * *
Eleven-fifteen. Just outside of Waterloo, Indiana. An hour delay for a disabled freight train on the track ahead. The cafe car has run out of food. Well, maybe they'll hold our train for us at Chicago.
* * *
We raised the station at 2 p.m., Chicago time, left Train 49, walked into the station by one door and were immediately waved out another.
"Train Five! To your right! Train Seven! To your right!" called the Amtrak employee at our entry gate. We obediently went right, dragging the duffel bag, and fetchingly draped with Sabu, my handbag, Steve's camera and laptop.
"Train Five?" asked the attendant at the next gate. "Straight down on your right."
So we went right again, traipsing past the mail cars to the first sleeper and Reggie the car attendant, who happily had us on his list. Upstairs we went, bearing, uh-huh, right, to room six and here we are, on our way to Naperville. It's 3:10 p.m., Chicago time, departure just forty minutes late.
Tuesday, May 25, 2004
The train rolled into Cleveland Station at 7:10 a.m., four hours behind schedule. Luckily, our connection to Salt Lake City doesn't leave Chicago Union Station until 2 p.m. We may make it. If we're close, says one of the attendants, they'll hold the train
for us. If we're not, Amtrak will put us up in a hotel and put us on the next train going our way. If that happens, we'll miss the library gig Thursday night. Urp.
But that's the future. In the past...
Around about 10 p.m. last night, Crew Chief Bob Schmidt discovered that Steve and I were going all the way to Chicago and moved us down to seats 23 and 24, mid-car. Once in our new digs, we had a glass of wine. Bob Schmidt stopped by to chat a bit and tell us about one of the conductors, who writes horror. Duty called eventually, Steve dozed while I had at Merry Gentry. It had been an adrenaline filled day and I was still somewhat wired.
The train quieted down by bits and pieces as people put their cellphones away, and settled in to sleep. At last, mine was the only light on. Steve slept fitfully and I didn't even want to try, but at last Merry wore me out and I nodded off. Sleep, as I say, was broken -- broken most thoroughly by a longish stop sometime in the early single digit hours. We looked, but there was only darkness outside the windows -- no station, no city, nobody on the road, if road there was – no stars.
Good ol' #49 at last got underway again. A crew member came by, saw we were awake and stopped to let us know that the train had run over a railway tie that had been left in the middle of the track. The conductors had removed it and the train was now moving
on. Which it did at a good clip. We both dozed off again, my head on Steve's shoulder, letting the train rock us to sleep.
And woke up to silence, the train once again motionless and nothing outside the windows but black night and the occasional headlight glare from a truck on the distant road. This was around 2:30 a.m., after we'd been stopped for awhile. It was too still and my back hurt from being crammed in the seat at a weird angle, so I straightened up, turned on the light and got back with Merry. My goodness, what adventures that girl has.
Steve woke up and we talked a little, low-voiced. One of the passengers across the aisle woke up and started folding papers, first loading her CD player and slipping the buttons into her ears. The guy in the seat behind me had a nightmare, kicked the back of my chair repeatedly, snorted awake, shifted position and went back to sleep.
We saw dawn bleach the edge of the sky a little after four, and at 5:30 a.m., the train started to move again.
The story from another crew member: The tie had in actuality been a pile of ties, which had splintered when the forward engine caught them up and though the conductors had removed the larger pieces, they had missed several which had gotten up into the workings and the wheel wells. In addition, the cowcatcher had been deformed by the impact and displayed a worrisome tendency to catch on the track. Concerned that we might derail, the conductors called ahead to CSX, which sent a crew down to weld the damaged cow catcher. The forward engine, with its compliment of splinters, was powered down and the back-up engine brought on line. Its now pulling the cars and pushing the forward locomotive, ever nearer to Chicago, bold heart.
The cafe car opened at 6:30 a.m. and breakfast was a microwaved bagel with cream cheese for me, an apple muffin for Steve and strong railroad coffee all around.
This train has been ill-wished from the beginning of the trip, according to Bob Schmidt, who naturally doesn't put it that way. There is, for instance, no dining car for the first class passengers and them others what're eager to pay five-star prices for two-star food. When they were putting the train set together at the yard in New York, the dining car was found to be defective in some way, and so it was "shopped." However, no other dining car was available, so a second café car was added, back near the sleepers, and stocked with frozen Stouffer's dinners, and that's what first class had for dinner. We did better, I'm thinking, with the d'angelo's sub that we packed in.
It's 7:40 a.m. and we're at the Elyria, Ohio station as I type. The schedule says we should've been here at 3:27 a.m.
This is going to be interesting.
Straying for a moment from the theme of disasters, the day outside my window is pleasant: slightly overcast and misty over Lake Erie as we rumbled through Cleveland. The marinas are so tight with watercraft you could walk from one end to the other, stepping from deck to deck. The Donald Z. Nelson was at dock being loaded with sand, or ore, or coal. A lone sailboat was out beyond the breakwater, sails full of wind. All of the water we've passed over or run by has been brown, and running swift, frothy with yesterday's rains. There are standing puddles in fields and yards, some patronized by a few puzzled but game Canada geese.
One of the joys of traveling by train is the lovely rolling greenness of the passing countryside. One of the horrors is seeing first hand how very much junk there is in this world. Man is the animal that clutters and leaves without cleaning up after himself.
Steve is dozing again. Me, I think I'll stare at the window a bit and then open the sample chapter file.
Eleven-fifteen. Just outside of Waterloo, Indiana. An hour delay for a disabled freight train on the track ahead. The cafe car has run out of food. Well, maybe they'll hold our train for us at Chicago.
We raised the station at 2 p.m., Chicago time, left Train 49, walked into the station by one door and were immediately waved out another.
"Train Five! To your right! Train Seven! To your right!" called the Amtrak employee at our entry gate. We obediently went right, dragging the duffel bag, and fetchingly draped with Sabu, my handbag, Steve's camera and laptop.
"Train Five?" asked the attendant at the next gate. "Straight down on your right."
So we went right again, traipsing past the mail cars to the first sleeper and Reggie the car attendant, who happily had us on his list. Upstairs we went, bearing, uh-huh, right, to room six and here we are, on our way to Naperville. It's 3:10 p.m., Chicago time, departure just forty minutes late.
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no subject
Date: 2004-06-04 09:28 am (UTC)Missed my publisher's party because the train was 5 hours late getting into the station. Almost missed the B&N bash as well. Paid 2-3x what I would have for a plane ticket. The benefit is that once you disembark, you're usually smack in the middle of the city rather than 30 miles away. Even so, while I was glad I gave the train a try, I don't know as I'd do it again.
no subject
Date: 2004-06-04 02:38 pm (UTC)It's so wonderful to go north or east, when it begins to turn green and stay that way. But it's very hard to come back to grayish brown, smog-choked here.
Memories....
Date: 2004-06-04 03:59 pm (UTC)Lately I hear that the smokers have all moved to the trains--maybe not true, but that rumor, and the high price, slowed my interest. If plane flight keeps increasing in price, we may all be returning the the trains... .
But my parents rave about taking the Canadian through the Rockies.
no subject
Date: 2004-06-04 05:26 pm (UTC)Traveling by train, we've been sorta late before -- I think we were an hour late getting into Chicago for WorldCon, which made arriving at our first panel in a dry and on-time condition -- challenging. But mostly the train's been fine, and, since neither one of us flies, its the only way we're able to travel long distances.
As for the planes being cheaper... After hearing what
Re: Memories....
Date: 2004-06-04 05:28 pm (UTC)This was our first smoke-free train. On previous trips, the cafe car has been a smoking zone. Now, smokers must step off the train in order to light up. One of our tablemates told us of a fellow who had felt the need to smoke on the last train they had been on. The conductor gave him a warning -- and put him off the train when he lit up again.
no subject
Date: 2004-06-04 05:36 pm (UTC)I do, too. It's soothing and exciting all at the same time.
It's so wonderful to go north or east, when it begins to turn green and stay that way. But it's very hard to come back to grayish brown, smog-choked here.
This trip was the first time we've gone across the Utah desert in the light, so we could actually see it. Terrible, ungiving country; so majestic, so aloof. So ...alien. I'm really glad to be back here where its green and moist and cool...
no subject
Date: 2004-06-04 08:07 pm (UTC)>marykaykare went through with the /p/e/t/t/y /t/y/r/a/n/t/s airport >security guards in order to >get to CONduit, I don't think I'd be >flying even if I flew anyway. >Yowzah! Some people just can't handle >power.
Did she post this in her LJ--I found references to a couple of trips, but no details.
I've almost reached the point where I don't enjoy travel at all. I can handle a drive of a couple of miles, but airporting is too danged rush-rush and inconvenient and I don't enjoy trains as much as I thought I would.
I just want to be beamed places.
no subject
Date: 2004-06-04 08:33 pm (UTC)I was in Virginia in September of 2001, and I was scheduled to fly home, out of Dulles, on the 11th. It was a three-hour drive to the airport. We were literally getting ready to get in the car to go when Dori's husband, who had left a few minutes earlier to go to work, started pounding on his car horn in the driveway.
One of the many things I'll never forgive my boss at the time for was the fact that not only did she show not the slightest concern about an employee she knew was scheduled to fly that day out of that airport, but when I did finally talk to her, she didn't seem to understand why I just couldn't take another flight. (Dulles was shut down for a week.) So I took the train from Charlottesville to Chicago, and home to New Mexico. It took three days, and I had a sleeper car to myself all the way, and I'm still paying for the hit to my credit card. But it was worth it, absolutely. And if I have the time and money, I'll be doing it again.
no subject
Date: 2004-06-04 08:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-06-05 08:12 am (UTC)Thought she'd said she had, but I may have misunderstood. The gist of the story as it was told me was that she and her husband reported to the airport the required time ahead of their flight, showed their tickets and IDs to a security guard, who pointed them at a second guard ten feet away and told them to show tickets and IDs to that guard, too. At which point, she said something like, "Now, here's a stupid concept."
She was immediately pulled out of line by the first guard, who informed her that she had a "hostile attitude" and that she'd better shape up or she would be kept off her flight. Obviously, this guard had never been to a SFWA meeting.
In any case, the guard's threat did not have the calming effect apparently desired. The supervisor was called for and instead of trying to defuse the situation made it worse, repeated the "hostile attitude" thing a couple of times just to make sure that everyone's temper was at high heat, and then called a cop.
This proved fortunate, as cops are trained in various methods of defusing warm situations. The summoned police officer calmed the situation handily, and our intrepid travelers were allowed to board their flight.
I just want to be beamed places.
That would be the best solution all around. As long as we can keep the agents of homeland security out of the picture.
Re: Memories....
Date: 2004-06-06 07:55 am (UTC)This would greatly increase the chances that I might change to train travel....
Trains and Security
Date: 2004-06-07 12:50 pm (UTC)The carefully sealed and air conditioned trains interest me less.
And, umm, spoiled... my preferences: cab ride (more open is better, even if it means I have to shovel stuff), observation platform (rear, open), or mid-train open air (flatcar, open car, open baggage car door, open window, vented window).
Last long train ride I took was an 6 hour excursion behind ex-SP 4449, a dozen or so cars all in Daylight livery up the Sacramento River Canyon. My group found a nice comfortable spot in the very pretty and comfortable articulated lounge car, air-conditioned behind impeccably clean glass. I immediately abandoned them, having spied the open baggage car door (safety-railed) and took up my position there. Despite the scorching heat and the promise of long (~mile) tunnels behind a steam engine going the legal limit. I can't image why none of my friends took pictures of me after, absolutely filthy. Took me days to get my hair untangled.
If I had my leisure, certainly I would take trains. Sigh.
I've never had problems at security, but then I understand some of the issues there...I deal with people who want me to do things "their way" all the time, sometimes, "their way" is simply not an option. It boggles me that people want ground level employees to change obviously established rules and procedures, regardless of what I think of those rules and procedures, rather than taking the issue up with with management and policymakers responsible for those rules.
Granted, there is more sport in baiting service employees (about stuff they have no control over) who have this passive-aggressive retaliation than there is in baiting the entirely powerless, but it still isn't sporting, especially if you aren't willing to take the possible penalty.
Anyway. Had a pleasant chat about LED flashlights on the way out...I think the checker would have traded his indestructible AAA flashlight for my cute doggie shaped clamplight (the light is spherical and pops out of the "head" clamp to be rolled around). On the way back, discussion about the philosophy of packing, and umm, Nutter Butters.
no subject
Date: 2004-06-07 02:02 pm (UTC)Adding in my trips before I met Sharon I'm probably pushing 50,000 miles -- and that's not as a commuter, but as a traveler.
Coming up? We'll be going to Trinoc*con by train in July. We made the run to BucConneer by train, and one run to ShevaCon by train...
Now what we need is an invite to a Gulf Coast convention -- and maybe Calgary...