Arrived in the grand old station in downtown Portland, Oregon, on Amtrak’s Empire Builder after a two train, almost three-day, transcontinental journey from Washington, DC. The last part of the trip was the best: cruising along the southern boundary of Glacier National Park in Montana. The sudden appearance of snow-capped peaks, rushing rivers, and tall trees coincided with arriving into the far western reaches of Mountain Time so that sunset occurred much later than usual.
It had been a good day on the train. We cadged a table in the observation car, not all that great for photos owing to grimy windows and the limits of admittedly much advanced cell-phone cameras. I recalled the domecar on the old Denver Zephyr and the high views to be had from the observation cars on the Canadian—especially the one we had to flee before it would be removed from the train at Edmonton.
The flatiron steak in the diner came out nicely medium-rare. The plates were not the china touted in Amtrak promos but plastic imitative of the real thing was better than riding on lesser trains had prepared us to encounter. The next morning was spent with the train speeding on the banks of the Columbia River, past the wonderfully-named Bridge of the Gods and the Bonneville Dam.
Travelling across the plains and empty expanses of eastern Montana recalled the similar and adjacent open space seen on The Canadian transcontinental trip through most of Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba. Right at sunset, we crossed from Wisconsin into Minnesota where there was a beautiful panoply of what seemed like endless lakes amid lush forests but actually was the meandering course of the upper origins of the Mississippi.
This all was a vast improvement from riding, or waiting, on the Capitol Limited, about 2½ hours out of Chicago, on Monday morning. The power on this Amtrak train went down about 45 minutes ago and after they brought it back, they still couldn’t get the computer and thus the engine going again.
So now the Lake Shore Limited, running about 45 minutes behind us, arrived on the scene and passed, backed up, and then hauled us into Chicago, where we caught the Empire Builder to Portland. The promise that all the connections, including ours, would be made was met.
This train, on which we paid a good deal for a bedroom, slightly bigger than the Marx Brothers’s designated “stateroom”, closer to a closet, in A Night at the Opera, had been operating on what I call a post-pandemic regimen, a far cry from its glory days as the flagship of the proud Baltimore & Ohio Railroad. The car designated as a diner/lounge provided microwaved, plastic-wrapped “flexible” meals; the lack of an observation car was mitigated by the fact that the train operated mostly at night.
As always, it was fun meeting people seated with us in the dining car whom we’d likely never have encountered elsewhere. People ride the train for a plenitude of reasons—irregular visits to family and a chance to just get away from it all. Wasn’t even discommoded when told I could’ve saved a bunch was taking the other leg of the train through Seattle to connect with a train that would also take us to Portland.
Aside from the breakdown in Indiana, where the Lake Shore Limited saved the day, there was hiccup about a half hour out of Chicago heading west when some unspecified “engine issue” delayed us for a few minutes—time, incidentally, that the generous stoppages at several points on the route—Winona, Minot, Shelby—allowed the train to make up easily.
I find I can gaze at the countryside for long periods of time that end up reducing the amount of reading I get done on long-haul trains. Physical exercise is limited to smoke breaks and clambering through the rocking of five cars to get to the diner. It’s oft been remarked upon that travelling across the U.S. by train is the way to gain some perception of the breadth of the country.
The accommodations on the Empire Builder were provided by what appeared to be a 3rd generation Superliner—double-decker sleepers with roomettes and bedrooms. There was more space—until the beds were pulled out and you could barely get passed the bottom one. Roomettes are tight but serviceable—for one, despite their being beds for two.
The single Portland-bound sleeper was five cars behind the diner, while the Seattle three were positioned on the front side of the dining car. Not surprisingly, the diner went to Seattle and our breakfast from the café to be consumed upstairs in the observation lounge dropped down to breakfast sandwiches wrapped Starbucks-style with other cellophane-packaged goodies. The strong coffee saved the meal.
Would I do it again? Probably not, mainly because I’ve gone coast-to-coast now three times: on The Canadian and The Southwest Chief, Amtrak’s version of the Santa Fe’s great Super Chief, as well as this Empire Builder. I won’t count a run from Salt Lake City to Emeryville (the Bay Area terminus adjacent to Oakland) and a long-previous trip through the Rockies on that Denver, Rio Grande, and Western Zephyr, the route now incorporated into this California Zephyr.
It's always great to take a new route, even if the train runs late (or, as London Transport warns passengers, “not at all”). The cross-country routes I’ve taken are regarded as the standouts of the system; much as I’d love to take the trip made famous by Arlo Guthrie on The City of New Orleans, I keep reading about how it appears to be the Amtrak stepchild in terms of services and accommodations.
But there are bright spots on the rail horizon: the Adirondack from New York to Montreal—from which I remember the gorgeous country alongside Lakes George and Champlain as well as the beautiful old New York Central Hudson River ride—is being shut down somewhere north of Albany this summer for the track to be upgraded. As nice as the scenery was, travelling at incredibly slow speeds does take away from pleasure of the expedition.
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