Scattered Thoughts . . .

As we departed Denver on Amtrak's historic and scenic California Zephyr, the rain quickly turned to a heavy wet snow.  We had already been warned that we would be trying to get through a bomb cyclone snow storm before it was impassable.   We slowly made our way into the Rocky Mountains.  We had been looking forward to seeing the scenery on this part of our journey because everything we read about it told us it is spectacular.  This route is actually famous for the beautiful scenery through this section of the country so we were definitely looking forward to this part of our journey.    Passing through this bomb cyclone turned out to be a good news-bad news sort of thing.  The good news was that the snow would probably add interest to the landscape and particularly the expansive views out the windows of our roomette.  As a photographer, I was excited about that.  The bad news is that while the snow is falling from this monstrous cyclone circling far overhead, we probably won

After our lunch in Chicago at Lou Mitchell's restaurant and a little bit of a sightseeing walk back to Union Station, we spent a little time in the brand new Amtrak Metropolitan Lounge before boarding the California Zephyr.  The Zephyr would take us all the way to California through scenic sights such as the Rocky Mountains, Sierra Nevadas, Moffat Tunnel, Colorado's Gore Canyon, Byers Canyon, Glenwood Canyon, Winter Park, Truckee River, Donner Pass, Donner Lake, and then into Roseville California where we would be greeted by Adam.  This leg of our journey would take about 50 hours spread across three days of the week. Since this leg is so long, I have decided to split up the blog entries for this leg.  This blog entry will be about our journey from Chicago to Denver.  We would be in Denver in just less than 24 hours after departing Chicago and traveling through Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska and part of Colorado. Although we enjoy every leg of our rail journeys, we were all very

We boarded the Lakeshore Limited in Springfield, Massachusetts in mid-afternoon after a quiet but nice evening at our hotel.  This was our third trip on the historic Lakeshore Limited route so we had a pretty good idea of what to expect...  the good and the not-so-good (more on that in another blog entry).  Sheila had booked us in two roomettes...  one for us, one for Will and Sue.   The roomettes have privacy, larger seats, a narrow closet and bunks.  These private rooms allow us to spread out a lot more than in Coach.  Will and Sue were in a roomette right across the narrow hall from us so we were still able to easily talk with them.   The Lakeshore Limited is a "Viewliner" train which includes a few sleeper cars, quite a few Coach cars, a Cafe car, and a dining car.  The dining car is located on the opposite end of the coach cars so this means that there is a bit more walking to do on these trains which, for a long cross-country journey, is welcomed news!  I thin

courtesy of Amtrak            Sheila and I will be heading on another cross-country rail journey with Sheila's parents very soon and we are now making all our final arrangements.  We've arranged hotels, contingency plans for delays, connecting trains, rental cars, and even decided upon some sightseeing and restaurants.  Arranging this coast to coast journey has required a lot of planning and coordinating and, at this point, we are on the homestretch and excited about this long distance journey.   Sheila's parents are accompanying us on this trip and we're all looking forward to it.  I believe it is safe to say that we're all a bit sick and tired of the grueling winter weather...  and most of us (three of the four of us) are sick and tired of being sick and tired.  We could use some down time on a cross-country train journey just taking in the views as the entire country passes by right outside the window of our sleeper car and all-glass lounge. Sheila, Wi