Journey By Train

By Kandra Hahn

This is my journal and travelogue of a trip on Amtrak from Lincoln to Chicago. I had urgent family business in Chicago. I’d had nothing but bad experiences recently on airlines, and I needed a break. I’d always liked trains but worried about the extra time it took and usually gave in and flew. I loved the spacious seats and the expansive hours reading, doing needlework, sleeping, sitting in the observation car or at leisurely meals in the dining car, chatting with perfect strangers I would never see again. These days I had to add in the sheer luxury of boarding with a six-ounce bottle of hand lotion and not having to stand barefoot, dumping my laptop computer into a plastic dishpan before sending it through an X-ray machine.

July 27, 2007, 4:45 a.m.

A little rain had settled the dust in my garden as I wheeled my bag by it in the dark on my way to the Amtrak station. The streets of Lincoln are quiet at that hour. The train — no, wait a minute — the California Zephyr, trailing its bygone glamour like a frayed, grayed petticoat, was a little late that Friday, in from the west, but not as late as some days. Right now, during summer maintenance, the train east is scheduled to depart at 5:02 a.m.; the train west at 12:29 a.m. Tip: Call the friendly local agent (it’s in the phone book) at 11 the previous night and get a good estimated time of departure so you don’t have to get up unnecessarily early on the day you travel.

5:59 a.m.

We board, a small family from Beatrice headed to see family in Chicago suburbs and me. I am surprised to hear that every seat is full. This is new and not what I had hoped. I will try — a little, not very hard — to find out why. Is it the government trying to shut Amtrak down? A paltry $1.3 billion more to send to Iraq or pour into concrete highways? That’s the 2007 national expenditure on Amtrak, most of it spent on the busy east coast corridor. Please note that doesn’t calculate the offsetting savings accrued in removal of travelers from clogged highways and airways. I wouldn’t go very far out on a limb to say that full costing would erase that modest subsidy.

All passenger cars are double-decked. Coach cars have restrooms, luggage storage and limited seating, reserved first for those who cannot manage the stairs. Most passengers stow their large bags and head upstairs.

I am seated, inexplicably, alone after all on the east side of the car, in time to see rosy-fingered dawn caress the fake water tower that cascades water into the little urban park next to the station in Lincoln’s Haymarket.

We roll out smoothly and quietly, gaining speed through Lincoln’s diagonal derriere, following Cornhusker Highway. I watch dawn’s fingers turn fiery as I pull up the leg rest and lean back to listen to the incessant train whistle (can this really be necessary?) and a little chorus of cell phone ring tones, a new sound in the train coach. I see a straight shot of Havelock Avenue, deserted, a rising sun framed at the eastern end as we pick up speed.

6:20 a.m.

We slow through Ashland and I catch a unique view of the Platte and historic Linoma Beach, still functioning as … something, but what is it? Can’t tell. We’re picking up speed again.

7:05 a.m.
It’s Omaha, a stop to drop off and gather in a few passengers. Then we turn south and run along the Missouri, not crossing until 8:10 a.m.

9:20 a.m.

We stop at Creston, Iowa. Smokers take note: No smoking anywhere anymore on the train. Gone are the smoking car lounges. Even I, a nonsmoker, remember with fondness, the pale curved wood paneling, a bar and the elegance of the smoking car of yesteryear. I think there was a writing desk, with complimentary stationary bearing the letterhead of the Union Pacific. There was china and very heavy silverware — and I do mean silverware, not stainless — in the dining car, and linens, not paper napkins, with the food cooked on the train, not heated up, and not so long ago. At least until 1965. I can vouch for that.

Anyway, Creston is a stop where travelers are invited to step out for a breath of fresh air and smokers step out and do otherwise. Some of us disembark but keep a nervous eye on the car. The crew, in turn, keeps an eye on us. They don’t want any trouble with lost passengers.

Back on the train, I’ve dug into the bag I packed with snacks, crosswords, good books, knitting and some work, just in case the spirit moves me. So far, a good book has been my companion. That’s my preference.

If you, however, take pleasure in casual conversation and learning about others, train travel, more than air, ought to be your mode of choice. Then you won’t be stuck next to someone like me, nose in a book, taking notes and gazing, without focus, out the window. If you don’t like your seatmate, just get up and roam. Meet someone else. Join up with one of the impromptu conversational groups that form among the chatty passengers or make your way to the observation car. That’s a sort of signal that you’re willing, even interested, in talking. You can even drop down to the snack bar below the observation deck and sit at the bar-like tables.

Ottumwa, Iowa

This is a long stop. Smokers burst from the train and others step leisurely to the platform. Families, knowing they have the time, take kids across the track toward the station and let them race on the grass, burning off pent-up energy.

Here Amish-looking families may board, their stern bags and bundles hiding Barbeque Pringles, among other snacks, one learns later. “Can a fella get some ice cream?” a young farmer asks me on board, as we gain speed toward the Mississippi. I express my doubts, the dining car lunch menu having previously been read out as $8.50 cheeseburgers and sandwiches for lunch, with pie and cheesecake for dessert. No mention of ice cream. The snack car touts candy bars and soda and, having been stocked in Denver the previous day, the steward of snacks is now warning of shortages. Imagine! Is this good management? I make a mental note to investigate … maybe. Or maybe take a nap.

Rigorous journaling is starting to seem a burden. Maybe just the highlights now.

Another good reason to love the train: No pilot to blast out on the sound system when you’re trying to sleep and natter at you about looking out the left side of the plane at something you can’t see and wouldn’t want to if you could. But the conductor does make a welcome announcement just before the train crosses the mighty Mississippi. The river is worth a look. All you have to do is look out the window. There it is for miles and miles.

The summer papers are carrying anecdotes of people who, after suffering weather-related eight-hour delays or cancellations, stop flying and start driving. Seasoned flyers are quoted as saying, “This is significantly worse than it has ever been.” The Department of Trans­portation reports that 32 pecent of flights were late in June 2007; 451,260 bags were lost, late or mishandled. FlightStats, a private data source, reports 17,236 flights cancelled in July, according to the Wall Street Journal.

United Airlines and Chicago O’Hare, my carrier of choice and its hub, are right up there among the worst. My last flight, the tipping point, took six hours, only a little more than one of them in the air. Lincoln passengers were shuffled to three different gates while waiting through two delays. At the final gate our flight wasn’t even posted. Woe to those who might have wandered away for a soda or bathroom break at the wrong time and missed the announcement.

I didn’t save money booking the train in July. The round-trip fare matched United’s less than two weeks out at $262 for a reserved coach seat. I just figured if I was going to spend six hours getting from here to there, I could add another five and do it in comfort and serenity. I have no regrets.

Will I meet other refugees? Not if I indulge my propensity for silent travel. I venture to the observation car. Perhaps I’ll overhear something. I don’t want to jump into this chat thing. I’ve struck up conversations before and people have followed me back to my seat to continue their life story — even though I feigned sleep. Dangers abound.

In the observation car, it’s mostly families and that means automation — games, DVD players and iPods — and the occasional book. One or two teenage pickups are in progress. I see no air-driven diaspora here.

I decide to descend to the snack bar and there, I break. The steward tells me they’re out of everything but root beer, orange soda and Diet Pepsi. I’m desperate and name my poison. “How come the train’s so crowded?” I inquire in my sophisticated undercover journalist mode.

“It’s always this way in the summer,” the steward shoots back, long past pleasance, staring at his empty candy bar cartons and overflowing trash bins. We’re a long way from Denver and he’s counting the clickity-clacks to Chicago.

I sit at a café table and spread out some papers. An adult with more patience than I have is playing a card game with three kids. It’s nice. There’s no canned music, just the sound of the wheels on the rails and outside the windows, tall, beautiful, unirrigated corn in some of the most productive acres in America, smack dab in the middle of Illinois. Galesburg and then Princeton. Naperville is practically Chicago. I call my daughter to discuss my arrival.

Chicago Union Station

Everyone out. The once grand old station can’t be defeated, although they’ve tried to do her in. In an apparent misguided attempt to compete with the airlines, the brilliant minds at Amtrak have tried to make the station look like a dumbed-down airport. But if you just keep going, dragging your wheeled luggage up worn marble steps, you will enter the beautiful old vaulted railway waiting room with its wooden waiting benches, and you will see the old signs, directing you up more steps to the grand old stinking streets of Chicago.

I find my way to the Clinton Street exit. My daughter has sent me a map (but you could find your own way online or with library resources). I roll two blocks south to the Chicago elevated/subway train station to catch the Blue Line to her neighborhood stop. It would be harder if I didn’t know to put $2 in the machine for a one-way trip ticket but you could do it.

My best tourist tip for Chicago: It’s not all business for me in Chicago and here’s my newest find. For the least cost, best way to see something different downtown, take the Chicago Watertaxi. You can pay a lot more and take a guided tour on the river if you want, but if your attention span is as short as mine, just pay $4 for a day pass and hop on at several riverside locations. One of them requires entry through Fulton’s restaurant. Enjoy the patrons’ shocked looks as you barge through, interrupting their upscale fish dinners — it’s an authentic Chicago experience. Find other boarding points at www.chicagowatertaxi.com or call 312-337-1446. It’s a refreshing and affordable summer pleasure and, in Chicago, I cherish the affordable.

Heading Home, August 2, 4:25 p.m.

The Zephyr leaves on time. My mission accomplished, I joined a large group to board for the trip west. The train is full. My mother gave me $20 to blow somewhere on my trip and I’m planning on leaving it in the dining car. Life is good even though I have a seatmate. And he’s young. And he wants to talk about his life.

He gets off in Naperville, the very first stop, and I pull out my knitting. We are speeding through those cornfields. The dining car steward announces dinner and reads out all the entrées. She’ll be moving through the cars to take reservations. By the time she gets to me, the only time slots left are 5:30 and 8:30. I chose the late slot. Anticipation, don’t you know?

It’s a long wait. I finish my book and take slightly less pleasure crossing the Mississippi going west than I did going east. The Minneapolis bridge has just collapse and the phrase “the river had scoured the bridge supports” keeps running through my head as the train slowly, slowly traverses its very own bridge over the wide river.

We’re just west of Osceola, Iowa, when my seating in the dining car is called. And here’s one of the really great experiences on trains — the dining car. For starters, the food is still good. I had salmon, very nicely done, with excellent accompaniments. I’m not sure how they manage it with cutbacks and reduced staff, but good for them. Then, to maximize limited space, every seat is filled, so four singles are seated together and, generally, get to know each other.

I’m seated next to a woman of a certain age who says she’s a ranger from Granby, Colo. I know Granby is an Amtrak stop. I’ve been there in search of hot springs for winter soaking. Across the table is a young female enlistee, en route to the wedding of two Army doctors in Denver. She hopes to make it time for the bachelorette party. Catty-corner from me is a dapper guy from Reno who says he books private rail cars for special parties. Who knew? When I say I work for the University of Nebraska, the conversation predictably turns to football and the table learns that I am the state’s only killjoy on that topic. That’s OK. I’ll make it up. I’m a good interviewer and I now know something interesting about each one of my tablemates, something much more interesting than football.

Dinner, when it comes, is on nasty plastic replicas of the once-great railroad china plates. We guess this is to save labor costs but our apparently well-informed rail car booker tells us some genius at Amtrak decided to cut down on the number of “water stops,” and there isn’t enough water on board anymore to wash the dishes full dining service produces. He tells us other tidbits. He says Amtrak contracts with the same folks who stock airplanes with beverage service but it means counting, stocking and restocking full inventories on and off the trains at terminal stops instead of just replenishing. I didn’t follow it all but he was very convincing, and I’m more than familiar with efficiencies that are brilliant on paper but abysmal in execution. In fact, aren’t they a hallmark of our time? Isn’t that what landed me on a train instead of a plane in the first place?

One more morsel from the table: I find a fellow air refugee. The lady soldier is fleeing the skies. Her last flight was so harrowing that she took the train, even though it means she may be late for the party. But the train gets to Denver at 7:35 a.m., the train expert protests. The party starts at 10 a.m., we elders learn, on a Friday yet. We are surprised. Then she tells us the bride is marrying a fundamentalist teetotaler and it’s a last fling. The rail expert pours her a glass of the very pleasing wine he’s ordered from the dining car’s stock, and we offer her the comfort we wish we could offer the bride, stifling our pointless and untimely counsel. These are the fleeting bonds forged on the rails.

We learn that the lady rancher is an adjusting widow and I get my second chance to speak, redeemed from my disinterest in team sports by my passion for the blood and tissue engineering of the scientists I work with at UNL.

I’m a slow eater but the others linger, one succumbing to cheesecake for dessert. We won’t part until the meal is over for all. No rush on the train. Why would you? No one’s going anywhere faster than anyone else. Night has drawn down over the plains with just streaks and splashes of light indicating farms and villages in Iowa.

When we four say goodbye and thanks, we know we’ll never see each other again but we wish each other a very sincere best of luck with the rest of our lives. I would care if I learned something had happened to any of these people.

I make my way back to my seat but as I pass through the observation car, I pass the Granby rancher widow who has already struck up a conversation with someone. She’s expertly passing on information about the reduced water stops. And so it goes.

The cars are dark, seats reclined, leg rests up, blankets spread and eyes closed. It’s quiet. Here and there a pinpoint overhead light is switched on and a reader is softly turning pages, perfectly reflected in a large, night-blacked window. I turn my light on and spread out a New York Times crossword puzzle, dozing off until the conductor comes discreetly through, selecting passengers to get off in Omaha. I start to think about where my bags are and how I will gather them together as I nod off for the last stretch to Lincoln. We’re heading in early.

I wake with a start, looking out on yellowy lights. I think … it is! It’s Lincoln. No one has wakened me and I know we’ll be stopping soon. I’m up and pulling my things together. I picked up some extra bags in Chicago — and here’s another great thing about train travel. All my bags are stowed on racks by the door. I’m the first one down to the door as the train is slowing. It’s only 11:45 p.m. The train is 35 minutes early into the station. And we’re home.

I step off the train and onto the platform. My family is there to greet me. They reach for my bags and we walk to the car. No waiting for a Jetway. No standing bent over in my seat as first class clears and everyone pulls oversized luggage from the teensy overhead compartments. No walking through a sterile no-man’s land of lonely pas­sengers and then standing on a curb, waiting for a vehicle that’s been circling for a half hour to see me or perhaps miss me and have to circle the airport again. I just step from the train, breathe the air and go home.

Note: By the end of August, the price to Chicago had fallen to $151 for a round trip. Adding sleeping amenities is pricey. A roomette for two that converts to berth-type beds at night, meals, linens, newspaper and bottled water included, with a car-shared toilet and shower, is about $216 each way in addition to the basic fare. A bedroom compartment for two, with the same amenities but private toilet and shower and an armchair by day, will set you back $547 each way on top of the basic fare. I wouldn’t recommend it to Chicago but I’d consider it as part of a vacation to the west where the timing makes more sense. It’s easy to check out fares and routes yourself at www.amtrak.com or 800-872-7245.

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