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It is now 3:35pm on Tuesday, May 25 and we just passed the eastbound California Zephyr, which would make it about an hour and forty-five minutes late. We’re not even out of the Chicago suburbs yet, and we’re already almost half an hour late! Apparently we had trouble getting clearance to leave Union Station or something like that.

What a grand adventure that I have embarked on! It all started a few months ago, when we convinced my grandmother to make the journey from Hawaii to our home nearby Chicago for my sister’s graduation. She hates flying, however, so we got her to fly to Los Angeles. I am traveling from Chicago to Emeryville via Amtrak’s California Zephyr, while my mother is flying to San Francisco on business. I am meeting her in San Francisco on Thursday, and on Friday we will take the Coast Starlight from Emeryville to Los Angeles. On Sunday morning, we will meet my grandmother at Los Angeles Airport, and fly back to Chicago with her.

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Depart Chicago at 2:48p (scheduled at 2:20p)
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My attendant, Linda, has thus far been a great presence on the train. She came around and introduced herself – quite loudly – to everyone and explained the features of the room. Though a bit on the boisterous side, she is very friendly and seems to be pretty efficient so far. The refreshment area is already fully stocked with coffee, juice and ice. She also announced that she would be putting coffee out about 4:30 or 5:00 tomorrow morning. Well, she didn’t exactly announce it, but someone asked her and, naturally, the rest of the car was able to hear her reply. I later decided that it was kind of nice having a loud attendant – you can hear what’s going on and it kind of keeps you “connected” to the rest of the train, if you know what I mean.

In the room across from me is a nice lady and her granddaughter, Eleanor and Maddie. ... Both of them agree that they train is a much nicer way to travel, and both of them really enjoyed the journey out here so far. After chatting on and off for the first couple of hours, we decided to eat dinner together and were joined by Bob, a gentleman that lives in New York and is traveling to Sacramento via rail “just for the fun of it.” He is a retired schoolteacher. We had a pleasant conversation over delicious halibut, chicken and steak about places we’ve been and other random topics of conversation.

It is Menu #5 for the westbound journey, and Menu #4 for the eastbound. I had the New York Strip Streak with mashed potatoes, which was absolutely excellent. Also on this particular menu is lamb, halibut, eggplant ravioli, and three different chicken dishes. I had the cheesecake with strawberry topping for dessert, which was also good. Sidnei in the Lounge Car just announced that tonight’s movie will be Big Fish, starting at 8:15. Maybe I’ll go check it out.

I walked the train gathering the entire consist, minus the P42 engines and the boxcars on the tail end. I’ll try and grab those tomorrow morning if I have time in Denver. The three coach cars are roughly half full or just a little more at this point in time, I would say. I did not venture into the rear sleeping car, but ours is almost full I think. Almost every room is occupied. It’s kind of interesting, actually… our sleeping car runs the entire spectrum, from an elderly couple to a pair of teenage girls and every age in-between.

Linda has been diligently helping everyone in our car make up their rooms for the night. She seems like a very “do-it-my-way” kind of person. Friendly, to be sure, but very efficient and rigid. Don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. At any rate, the refreshment area is still well-stocked and she put out some mints and chocolates for everyone to take. I don’t know if that’s standard Amtrak practice or not, but it won me over!

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Some truly awesome sights west of Denver. After scaling the Rocky Mountains and passing through the many tunnels (I counted at least 20), the conductor announced the approaching 6.2-mile Moffat Tunnel – the one that will be closed for track work this summer, forcing the detour of the Zephry through Wyoming. The conductor asked us to remain in our cars for the “6.2 miles of scenic darkness,” so that diesel fumes could not enter the train – only to be put on a siding for ten minutes. Finally, we were allowed to proceed through the tunnel without incident.

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I was seated for lunch with a nice couple and another gentleman, but I don’t think we ever exchanged names (or if we did, I don’t recall.) It was kind of a subdued lunch. The only thing that I really remember was that it ended up being very late – almost 2:30 – before we finally ate! I had the angus beef burger, which was excellent. We passed the eastbound California Zephyr while at lunch at 1:48 pm – it appears as though it was right on time!

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I’ve heard that Sparks, NV is supposed to be a service/smoking stop, but either that changed or the crew just decided to move it one stop further to Reno. So we only stopped briefly at Sparks and longer at Reno, enabling us to get out and walk around. After that came the next superbly scenic part of the trip – Donner Pass and the surrounding area. This might have been my favorite part of the scenery during the whole trip.

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Lunch, our final meal on the train, was called soon after, and the three of them [people whom I met during a part of the travelogue that I cut out] and I sat together again. It was a good meal. I was debating between a couple menu items, but all three of them got the beef burger so I decided to get that again too. It was excellent again, of course. I was too full after the previous lunch and dinner to get dessert, but I had to get something for lunch, being the last meal and all. I ended up just getting some vanilla ice cream with strawberry topping (which our nice server spooned on very liberally).

My tipping scheme was rather unusual on this trip. At the beginning, I tried to follow the guidelines outlined on the TrainWeb website, which is about $1 for breakfast and lunch and $2 for dinner. So I did that at the beginning, but towards the end I was thinking that it didn’t seem like much and I was really happy with the wonderful service that they all provided, from the friendly Steward all the way down. So I actually ended up leaving $11 at the final lunch. Overall, I calculated that I would have spent about $70 on meals for the whole trip, and all told I left about $18 in tips, which is a little over 20%. So it worked out just fine.

Overall, it was a terrific trip. The staff was wonderful, the food was great, and the scenery was marvelous. Linda was a really good attendant, overall. Yvonne gave her $20 for all her help with the room situation. I was debating a little bit, but I ended up giving her $20 too, because she always promptly made up my room when I was at breakfast and had nice little touches like fresh roses for the refreshment area and after-dinner mints. We made up quite a bit of time going into California, and ended up arriving in Emeryville at 6:11 pm, only an hour and two minutes late.

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Arrive Emeryville at 6:11p (scheduled 5:09p)
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Car Attendant: Linda Jenkins
Dining Car Steward: John Rivers
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CONSIST (Tue May 25 2004 WB California Zephyr #5)
178 - P42DC
134 - P42DC
1249 Baggage
39021 Superliner II Transition Sleeper
34045 Superliner I Coach
34082 Superliner I Coach
31520 Superliner I Smoking Coach
33032 Superliner II Sighteer Lounge
38025 Superliner I Dining Car
32015 Superliner I Sleeping Car (my car)
32021 Superliner I Sleeping Car
71280 Express Car
71185 Express Car
71270 Express Car
...

I met my mom without incident in Emeryville; we stayed at the Four Points Sheraton. It’s a very nice hotel, just across the pedestrian bridge and another street. There’s even free Internet! That was exciting. There is also a very nice shopping strip just a couple of blocks away, with a number of unique restaurants. Anyway, before going to bed, we called 1-800-USA-RAIL and discovered from Julie that the southbound Coast Starlight was already running about an hour and a half late. That’s not too bad, right? Well, that’s what we thought.

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Coast Starlight trip report coming soon!

Post your email if you would like a copy of the report in its entirety in a Microsoft Word document.