Month: May 2016

A few random notes on leaving Seattle. One thing I forgot to mention which is unfortunate, was seeing Mount Shasta in California at dawn. It was most unusual, in that it was just hit by the rising sun and broke through the clouds with some stuck to it like cotton! Quite a sight for an early morning. The same could not be said for Mount St. Helen as it was shrouded in clouds and rain when we got near to it. I’m still coming to grips with some of the scenery that is out there. After awhile you get a bit blase’ about vistas but this stuff takes your breath away. There are no words that describe it sufficiently. So, in most cases, you fall back on trite phrases and platitudes and even then they cannot express what you are seeing. And I am anticipating that it will only be better in the Rocky Mountains, in fact I know it will because I have seen what it looks like on the other side of the border.

Oh, yes, although I have not mentioned food in all this carrying on, I would like to say that last night I had one very special Caesar Salad unlike any I have had before! Heck of Sunday dinner and a pretty weird place to have in, the hotel bar but, man, it was wonderful! In this hotel, the bar and restaurant are combined in such a way as to be indistinguishable from each other and just to confuse it more the business center is also included in the mix. But the food is good and there is plenty of it. Yes, and there is the business of a complimentary breakfast in LA, that hotel had breakfast and a buffet for the guests, you just showed up and chowed down and it was free! Now that is a perk! Did I mention, that when I Google Earthed that hotel and you went to street level  it was in the lobby of the Hotel!! Now that is research!
If you have been paying attention to these ramblings, you know I have been obsessing about my packing. Well, there is going to be some major re-thinking in that area before I take off again. First of all, the Rucksack, that seemed to be a solution to a second piece is a failure in many ways. One the material it was made of failed- ripped out by what ever I had in part of it. I like the pockets but it’s just too hard to get things in and out of them with ease. So we will see what we can do about that. But the prime problem and I guess I was aware of it before the trip is that it weighs too much and is too unbalanced when carried on the roll-around suitcase. I guess what is needed is a small duffle that can be bungyed to the collapsing handle. Also I had included some civilian MREs with me just in case- they worked out but I now see that I need to augment them with other items-( thank goodness a friend mentioned that the original MREs have too much stuff in them and need to be re-packaged for use in the field and he was so right!) And I found out that my first aid kit which was a fine idea needs more stuff in it too. More bandaides mostly!
One thing that was a disappointment was slippers, I had some nice lined moccasins that I thought would work and then they took up too much space and were not easy to get to, so it looks like they will be replaced with slipper socks that will collapse way down to a much smaller size.
Today will be disjointed as I have to check out of the hotel before noon and the train does not leave until later in the afternoon so I guess I will have to hang out at the train station. And I will miss lunch because of it. Not that that is a hard ship as all I have been doing is eating anyway! ( I found out that since the big remodel at the King street station they don’t even have vending machines or the usual fast food place.) Oh well, there is always a steak on the train to look forward to, I guess!

Coming into Seattle is an experience. Especially by train. You come down the shore of Puget sound with all the sights of a sea coast, old pilings, pieces of ships, fishing shacks and boat yards, the Boeing Air craft plant with its own airfield and in the distance, the Tacoma narrows bridge! Two of them now, as one was not enough for the present day traffic or as the speaker from “Rails to Trails” put it, ” Three, because “Galloping Gertie” the first bridge is under the water at the same place where it fell in November of 1940. And then into Seattle, where there are lots of new and seemingly expensive housing being built and sold. As you get closer to the old King street Station you notice a big building that looks like a monster ship from outer space, “Century Link Field.” Not sure what was on for the night but between the fence and the field a bunch of young men seemed to be concentrating on a lively game of football and it was in a pretty good mist of rain that had been threatening since we came out of the mountains. It seems out of place with the old Railroad station from another century and another power base, that of the the Great Northern Road. This was the power house railroad of the Northwest for the later half of the nineteenth and first half of the twentieth centuries. The old station is in remarkable repair having gone through an extensive restoration. Hundreds of trains came and went at this station in the old days where only a few leave and come today.

I think I was surprised at the hills of Seattle even though I have been here before I did not remember how steep they were. Of course this is the original “skid row” where lumbermen skidded logs down to the mills. Which, I am sure is why almost every freight train we passed or passed us was loaded with many cars of cut lumber ready for building. Seattle is the home of the Weyerhaeuser Company that started back home and whose head quarters resembles Deere and Company’s grand building the only difference is it is made of wood rather than Cor-ten Steel. Out in the northwest lumber still has influence. And Weyerhaeuser still is cultivating and harvesting trees for lumber.

Tomorrow, wherein our intrepid traveler leaves his adventures in the Northwest and begins anew on another train, thrills, excitement and the romance of the rails!

Okay, now the world has gotten one step more complicated. I was doing pretty well with things until I ran into the card/key for the hotel room. Now I know these things have been around a long time and I guess I still suffer from the”barnacle on the side of progress” syndrome. What the heck I still am fascinated with a credit card and buying things on line! So I check in to the hotel on the trip and they give me this card thing and in the first hotel it opened the door by sort of waving it at the door lock. And the door sort of “beeped” at you and unlocked. Now at the second hotel not only does it operate the door it also operates the elevator! But you have to insert the correct way or you end up looking like an idiot with a car full of other people who want the elevator to go in their direction and not someone who is too stupid to use the card properly! Somehow I did not know it was going to be this complex, when did a door become such a challenge? Did I miss a memo or something? I suppose the next thing is bio-metric locks for your hotel room, when you check in they finger print you, issue you a card with your finger print on it and that opens the door. I keep thinking what happened to keys?
Speaking of which, on the train all the SCA had really big keys that seem to open all kinds of secret compartments. When the toilets refused to do their duty on the Coast Starlight, one of the attendants opened a big door some where near to the rest rooms and messed with some switches and they all flushed again- the magic of the big keys. Some how on this particular train car or cars the electrical systems seemed to be a bit of a problem and that is why it was late out the gate at the Union Depot in Los Angeles. The key business wasn’t the only thing I noticed about the personel on the train, they all seemed to have lots of equipment hanging off their persons, badges, cell phones, walkie-talkies, and other stuff.
One time the train stopped and it seemed to be in some isolated spot in the mountains and then it backed up and there was the conductor out side the train! I was wondering what he had done. I had heard that they put people off the train for doing something that was forbidden, like smoking, which they
frown on, I was wondering what the heck the conductor had done that we were leaving him on the side of the track. It turned out that he had to manually throw a switch that malfunctioned when it was signaled to change electronically.

My idea on this trip was to keep blogging all the way when ever and where ever possible. Again “I was hoisted on my own Pitard!”  I forgot that the Internet was dependant on electronic signals ( how soon we forget sitting in our bed room with steady constant signals seeming coming in from the ether!) So as the train is traveling up the Pacific coast and I am enjoying myself watching the scenery go by, I am happily typing away and suddenly there is no signal, no bars, nothing! And the computer informs me, ” No Service!” What the heck? Come to the realization that no matter what I thought, you just don’t have an Internet connection in the mountains- as you have no antennas or any place to put them- ( Now in Los Angeles, they disguise them as palm trees- not a very good disguise as they have all these antenna things sticking out of them and if they looked like palm trees nobody was fooled- then it occurred to me that maybe they had just stuck the antenna in a real Palm tree!) Oh by the way, for an old Midwesterner, palm trees look fake! They look like the green men from the movie studios put them together to amuse the tourists. They cannot be real!

Also I found that if there was a signal no matter how weak it would not follow you into a tunnel and there are many tunnels in the mountains of the northwest. ( I don’t recall the early pioneers having a problem with this on the Oregon trail, and Jim Bridger didn’t mention it in his diaries of the difficulties he experienced on his way west. )  And there was the maddening delay between when you exited the tunnel and the signal finally caught up to your computer again. More often than not I resorted to writing out my ideas on paper using a pencil ( as low tech as possible!) and then transcribing the material when I had a signal again. Then there was the business of keeping all the things charged- The train has plugs but usually there is only one that was accessible so if you did not have a multiple outlet with you there is a good chance something was going to blow it’s battery charge before every thing was up to snuff.      ( my I-pad requires two cords one for the pad and one for the key board and each charges differently!)

Once you get going traveling a remarkable thing happens, you lose track of what day it is. This can be good or bad- good if you are trying just to get away from things, bad if you have to be somewhere on time with your act together. I keep losing track of the day so I depend on my I-phone for that information and so far it’s doing a good job- now as for time it has a bit of a problem keeping up with the zone changes but eventually it’s caught up.

Oh, yes, I forgot to mention one thing about communal dining on the train, some times it’s a dead loss! I was seated at lunch with three people from China! They were barely conversant in English and my Chinese is known to be none existent so lunch was pretty much quiet! They had Pork shanks and I had the famous Amtrak Angus steak burger! But they were nice enough folks. ( they got off the train in Portland- in case anyone was interested.)

Some one asked how close does the train get to the ocean on the trip? Well, this photo should answer the question. That’s the ocean, the highway ( 101) and the train tracks! And there are places where the train tracks are on the other side of the highway. The surf was up yesterday and every so often you would see some surfer-boys trying their stuff against a good wave or two. . . (“Dude”) Back in the day, I could never quite understand the surfer-culture but spend some time in California around the Ocean and you can get just a glimmer of what is so attractive to those who follow the waves. What could be better than some sand, some sea, a tasty brew or two and hanging ten on your board? ( so what if all this is my imagination, I say, dream on, kid!) With all this traveling I might just have to come back and see what this California stuff is all about since now, I have an invitation to check it out and do some “splorin’.” ( maybe I should affect a bushy,bushy blond hairdo and get some open-toed huaraches!-probably not, I am only 30 years too late and many years too old for this stuff!)

One thing about travel, it sure gets you out of your comfort zone! This morning I was served breakfast by an Indian woman ( from India-not Native American) and a young lady from Japan and I was checked into the hotel by lady from Korea-my bags were brought upstairs by a nice young man from Honduras. ( and this was just in the hotel!) My cab driver last night was Pakastani. I had mentioned that my first SCA on the Southwest Chief was Ha-Zeus ( Jesus) who had learned his trade on the Mexican Railroad and was hired from them by Amtrak? So far he was one of the best, although the SCA on the Coast Starlight , R.C. Came from a railroad family and has been studying to be a conductor and had passed the exam and now was on the available list! From what I can see he is going to be one of the best!

Some where up the California coast! Here the sun was finally shining but it was still cool and at this time the train was about an hour late. ( The new technology kept me on-track with our schedule.)  One of the benefits of train travel is every so often they schedule a “smoke-break” and all the addicted ones can get off and puff to their hearts content. The rest of us use the time to get off and stretch out legs and run up and down the platform- those of us who still can run that is. Noticeable on this run      ( The Coast Starlight) the tracks are smoother making the trip that much more enjoyable. Of all the runs that Amtrak makes this might be the most varied and some might say impressive. The train spends a lot of time in the mountains and at the southern end of the route the mountains are brown and desert-like but at the northern end they are lush and green with water courses spilling down the rocky hillsides and clouds stuck to the trees like so much cotton candy! Of the long distance routes this one is the most popular and the train I took was no different as it was full all the way.

Which brings up the concept of meal time. Amtrak practices communal seating. You show up in the dining car and you are seated where there is space. Now this is one of the more charming attractions to the train ride. You get to talk to diverse people about diverse things. Of all the meals I had on the trip so far I have talked about my trip, about families all over the country and lastly I met two young ladies from Seattle who were computer code writers and we talked nothing but computers for an hour, until they requested that we leave so others could eat! Oh yes, there was the couple from Houston, Texas who when we were served asked if we could say a table grace which I though was totally appropriate and we did. ( some how thanking the supreme being for a fine steak on a train seemed to be a good idea!)

Oh, yes did I mention that on the Southwest Chief there were some Mennonites which I saw only at the last moment, I was hoping to talk to them so I could practice my forgotten German but they must have gotten off by the time I knew they were riding with us- Both the Amish and the Mennoites see no problem with riding the train since they are not responsible for the operation!

 

(How are you going to keep the kid down on the farm when he’s seen the lights of LA?)

(Mystery of the Metropolitan Lounge!) One of the “treats” of train travel are the little hidden things that you find out about in sniffing around the corners and edges of travel sites on the Internet. The lounge business is one of these. Not every station big or little has a special lounge for long distance travelers. Los Angeles and Chicago are two that I am aware. As mentioned I was on the look out for the one in Los Angeles  as I had heard about it and wanted to see what the fuss was about. Well, I was right about it being hidden. You had to be on your “A”game to find it. It was behind the Amtrak Ticket Area, where there was a small sign, very modest, directing you to an elevator that would take you to a second floor area. Now, if I did not know about this and where  it was I would have been out with the rest of the hoy-palloy sitting out in the great hall looking at the ceiling! Once you got off the elevator there it was and you were  greeted by a little enthusiastic Amtrak employee who checked your ticket, ( they did not want just any Joe Doak finding their way into to this “sanctum-sanctorium”) informed you where to put your luggage, asked if you wanted it to be checked, and showed you the wide range of refreshments for your dining pleasure. And also showed the password for the free Wi-Fi. So this is what it was like to be “a special Customer!     “holy punched ticket, traveler!” So by-gumpy I was going to partake in these dubious pleasures placed before me! First I scoped out a seat near the back door, flung myself into the padded chair and checked out the scene. The place was already crowded with people like me who were getting on the “Coast Starlight,” but there were other folks who where getting on other trains headed out in various directions and more kept coming.

Now I had arrived early so I could find this place so I had plenty of time to look about. One thing that was pretty obvious, there are a lot of “gray-hairs” traveling and a lot of them are just like me, just riding the rails for the heck of it. There was an added wrinkle to this bustling scene, people are allowed to bring small pets on board the train now. And so there was woman with a small dog in a ratty carrier ( I am not kidding, this carrier was patched with various kinds of worn duct tape!) the little dog was none to happy about this either and expressed his opinion in various squeaks,growls and muffled barks. I keep thinking, ” what was Amtrak up to with this new idea?”

The whole idea of the lounge, other than keeping the rich travelers from mixing with the ordinary “Coach riff-raff” was you were escorted to the platform early so you could avoid the rush to get on the train. It was a good idea, well intentioned and might have worked but we Amtrak passengers are like a herd of pussy cats and once the little man started us off and we all got on the elevator it was every person for themselves! If I had thought about it I could have ridden with the red-cap in his people mover cart and really looked down my nose and at the little people. No, I trecked out to the platform with the rest of them looking at the signs that indicated which car I was to get on. Only there wasn’t a train next to the track! Then came the announcement that the train was late! This is where the train started, how could it be late? So we all milled around the platform, with our luggage, trying to stay out of each other’s way.

Now it’s May in Los Angeles, it should be warm but there was a spanking wind and the temperature was in the low 50s. For this trip I had been given the advice to wear “layers,” I have never been so glad to have followed that advice! ( in fact I almost went into my luggage for my gloves!) Finally, after about 40 minutes the train backed into the station without a bye or leave and we all scambled aboard. One thing I had not considered, looking at my ticket, these cars are double deck, of course I thought I was upstairs, surprise, I was downstairs and so were several other folks. Well the stairs are bearly wide enough for one person going sideways but several, with luggage and the passage is nigh impossible. ( I would like to meet the guy who designed the stairs in these coaches, I would like to make him run up and down them several times with a backpack weighing 50 or so pounds!)

(Having fun on the train or is me, or is this train getting later by the minute?)

(Wherein our hero gets ready to leave the City of Angels and travel many miles up the West coast to Seattle!) One of the things I wanted to look into in LA was the Metro Lounge for us “Luxury travelers.” I knew it was located in the Union Depot somewhere and so it was Google time to find out where it was. For some reason I thought it might be in the basement behind some locked doors with a sign that read “Beware the Leopard!” From what I can gather it’s almost that difficult to find. So I am going to the  depot just a bit early and see if it’s possible to partake of its wonders. It’s the little things on this trip that amaze and amuse.

One little thing that I did not anticipate was time differentials! My body clock is on Central daylight Time and I am in the Pacific Daylight time zone! So I am up in what is the middle of the night but at home it’s about dawn! How screwed up can you get? But breakfast is at 6:00, so I can get that out of the way, settle up with the Hotel and hit the road early.

Another thing that was not on my radar was California is still in a drought situation and every thing is oriented to saving the amount of water used. Cool it in the shower, don’t use too many towels and if you are drinking the water, get it from a bottle not the tap! ( of course, what heck do you expect when you put a major city in what essentially a desert without any water resources and tell every body to come out and enjoy the sunny weather! And they did!)

Some observations while I am at it. Every water course in LA is a cement gorge! And from my observation there was no water in the cement valleys!  The city has grown in some strange ways, especially on the edges. It seems that as the center expanded the junk, businesses that dealt in transport or manufacture all were pushed to the edges and none too neatly. If there was an empty lot a house was put on to it, maybe two or even three. The same was true if there was a pile of dirt disguised as a mountain, put building on, around, on the side of it. Oh, yes and paint them strange colors! Someone canned the rainbow and used it as paint!  If you thought that some one lied about the “car culture,” they didn’t from the hotel window I can see a major free way and every time I look it’s filled with cars, I sure hope they have some idea where they are going. 

(In the sky over Los Angeles) Or so I imagined! In the process of working on the planning for this trip I used several different sources to make it work and so that I did not have to re-invent the wheel. Hotels are a mystery to me and booking them even more so. I did the review bit on the various travel sites. I looked at hotels that were not too far from the depots in the cities I intended to visit. Even used Google earth to see what they looked like. The final selection was could I make a deal where I would always use the same chain. Which was the solution I used and right at this point it’s working but it’s the first hotel too. A couple of factors came in to play. Free Wi-Fi, if I belonged to their “club” I got that free, what if I arrived early or late depending on the train? Guaranteed reservations! This was necessary in Seattle as the train might be late and it was already arriving late as it was. So it was the Hilton chain all the way, I get reward points, wi-if, chocolate chip cookies on arrival and I have reserved time no matter when I turn up. ( Oh yes, do they have a restaurant on site as I am not going in search of one since I have things I need to do in the silence of the room-that, by the way is not in motion.) So in Los Angeles, here I am on the 19th floor high above the LA police car park and Korea town. But it’s mostly quiet- except for sirens-( it’s a big city, and they are busy! Hello?) It cannot be any worse than at home with train whistles all night! It was kind of an insult to the cab driver to run me from the depot to the hotel, but I had anticipated that and made sure there was a nice tip in it for him.  So in the morning I will repeat the trip and have the concierge call me a cab ( “so -you’re a cab!) On the Southwest chief I scheduled a room, on the Coast Starlight I will have a roomette, less space but for a shorter time and I really don’t need the shower!

Oh, one thing that being on the 19th floor in Los Angeles that makes it a unique experience, helicopters fly almost at window level, which to put it mildly is a bit disconcerting. I keep thinking that the CIA is spying on me, but a helicopter is not very subtle! 

For most folks who travel by train there is a disconnect between the trip and what’s going on outside the window. But as far as I am concerned it makes the trip almost necessary to grasp just how beautiful and wonderful the natural world of the US is. In many written pieces about the trip I have read how boring the Midwest landscape is. My reaction to that is how insensitive the writer must be to what is going on out there. After coming across the plains of Illinois, Iowa, Missouri, you get an idea of how rich the land is with plantings, of stories, of how rugged the land really is and how it never gives up its riches without a struggle. The little towns that used to be the life’s blood of the nation of small farmers now fall apart under the noon day sun. And it’s not just one but many. Some that rejoiced with the coming of the railroad and fortune now are nothing more than empty store fronts and a depot that stands empty and forlorn. The latest train goes by without a hoot or hollar and its after breeze pulls at the aging clapboards of the old building. The land scape that we just passed through was just beginning to become a mature green with late spring. The fields were just showing green from the late plantings and still the big tractors were out there with last minute hustle to finish the job with corn and beans, beans and corn. To the deserning eye  could tell the difference between shoots of corn and shoots of beans. The fields were planted right up to the fence line right next to the railroad right-of -way.  Contrary to the stories, the land is not flat and boring but it undulates and the further west you go the greater the undulation, variation and vegatation. On a train moving through this county you can see how it changes from county to county, state to state. How over the eons nature has performed magic and the people who tend the fields have just nuged her along just a bit.

The land tells stories about what it has done and what has been done to it. Almost every time a time zone changes ( because of the Railroad) so does what the land looks like and feels like and what is going on both on the surface and underneath it. A time zone is invisible, there really is no dotted line running down the face of the land that says its a hour earlier than before. But there is a palpable difference for those who notice. The more westerly you travel, rain is not your friend or even your acquaintance. Your partner in the fields is what is under the fields in big prehistoric lakes. Big skeletal arms become your partner turning the fields green. Then there are really no liquid friends. The ground is rock, stone, left overs from ages back before there were rail roads, men and women to run them. The stories that land here tells are about upheaval, up thrust rock going up, rock going down and only the most tenacious  of plants hang on, so twisted and blasted to be out of some sweat soaked dream. the survivors still green, the departed white and skeletal.  This land is even colored differently, pale red and creme, layered like some kind of mad cake. What grows here has character and shows its here for the ages. No harvest here, no cash crop gone at the end of the season. The only temporary things are animals and the people who tend the animals, their buildings and things. Here the rails come so close that you can almost reach out and touch the red rocks, the skeletal branches. Now you are moving slowly because it’s a hard climb up grade, only 2 percent but for the train that’s enough for a struggle. Slow orders up to the summit.