2011 Rudisill Reunion/Phase 1

San Diego to Chicago/Amtrak Wednesday, August 31

Days 1-3: San Diego-Los Angeles-Chicago

Norm dropped us off at the Santa Fe Depot by 9:00 a.m., we swished our bar-coded reservation printout at the kiosk, took our printed tickets and not-needed-yet bag to baggage check, boarded the Surfliner and settled in for the familiar ride to Los Angeles.

We had plenty of time until our next departure so we checked our three remaining small bags of current luggage, walked across to Olvera Street, had lunch, checked out the shopping opportunities, walked a bit, returned, boarded our train, and the bags weren't there as promised, Don went back for the bags (news to them that we were told they would be delivered to our sleeper car), still had time and settled in to our new routine. Sit, eat, sit, sleep, sit, eat, sit, sit, sit, etc. But with the sleeper car, coffee, juice, bottled water are available, meals are included and someone else makes the bed twice a day. PLUS, the train was sold out and the coach seats were packed.

Our sleeper car was tacked onto a train route ending in San Antonio to be attached to a different engine so we were the last car in line - we had plenty of exercise going through five coach cars and a lounge to get to each meal. The coach seats were packed with people of all sizes and it looked mighty uncomfortable, although those seats had extra leg supports that pulled out. Another nice feature of being that far back – the required train whistles are somewhat muted.

It was an overnight in San Antonio and we were late arriving (1:00 am instead of 11:00 pm) but Don was out in his pajamas watching the cars get switched. The route from San Antonio on has some rough spots with a lot of rocking and rolling, so we did burn through some more calories getting to and from our meals. The terrain through Texas is pretty dry (drought conditions). We passed through St. Louis at breakfast and saw the arch for the first time. Going through farm country, there were miles and miles of corn fields and (we think) soy fields.

We were three hours late in arriving in Chicago, reasons including the hot weather (trains can travel no faster than 50 mph when outside temperatures go over 100F), heavy freight traffic and holiday weekend travel to Chicago for a popular Cubs game and free jazz festival plus perfect expected weather. It had rained before our arrival but we were able to handily walk to our hotel, the Palmer House, right downtown Chicago.