Amtrak dreaming, or, why I like road trips (12 July 2017)

Ain’t travel fun?

We’ve flown, and had to wait for an hour on the tarmac in Sydney after arrival because of a broken plane at our gate. We’ve tried Greyhound and experienced delays for who knows what reasons. And now we’ve gone Amtrak. It started off well, leaving Seattle pretty much on time, soon after 9.30am. We arrived in Portland on time at 1:50pm, expecting to depart there at 2:25pm. Then the fun started…

Apparently the plough on the front of the locomotive engine was too low and was scraping the rail, which is not a good thing. So, delay, of course. First the engineers tried to blow torch the bit that was too low, but that wasn’t working, so they took the locomotive away and said they were getting a new one which would be a freight locomotive and would have to go slower. The new departure was given as 5:15pm. Well, while waiting for the new locomotive to appear, the engineers kept working on the original one and got it fixed. Back to Plan A. By this time it was 4:30pm, and we were off at 4:55pm, only two and a half hours late. (Better than the reputed 9 hours late of a recent train into Seattle from LA.)

(Yes, Megan, you told us so.)

While all this was happening another train was due for departure but we were in the way, so those passengers had to board their train by walking through ours! (Though I think that’s not a totally unusual occurrence.)

The question in our minds was, would we still have light for the mountain scenery. Nope, we didn’t. We hit the mountains just as the sun was about to depart. A lovely mauve light, but not much good for photography from the train. The main scenery we saw in daylight hours comprised light industrial areas of towns, small towns, and farms. Interesting enough, but not some of the spectacular scenery we’d hoped for. 

The trip, besides this delay, was uneventful. We both slept fitfully, but did get some sleep. Len’s Garmin reported that he’d had 2hrs 20mins of heavy sleep, and 4hrs 40mins of light. That probably mirrors me too … it could  have been worse. The best thing was that we arrived in Sacramento at the civilised (albeit 3 hours late) time of 9:15am. We could live with that! But, that was 13 July, which is the subject of our next post.

Community seating… A railway tradition 

We were impressed by the good nature and hard work of the onboard staff. The dining team did a great job of organising us into various sittings, and we also enjoyed relaxing in the Parlour Car. The dining was organised – as it was on the Ghan – according to the railway tradition of community seating. That means that if you are a “party of one, two or three people, you will be placed at a table with one, two or three other people”. A great way to meet new people, the announcement said. And of course it was.

Because of the delay, we ended up having three meals – lunch, dinner and breakfast – instead of just two, as we’d expected. At lunch, we met a Danish couple who were keen travellers and had been to Australia. We had much to talk about (including Danish TV like Borgen and The Bridge). At dinner, we dined with two singles, a middle-aged vegan woman from the Californian town of Julian, and a heavily tattooed-and-pierced young woman from Vancouver. With these two, we enjoyed a political discussion, mostly about food and climate. It could have become a little tense a couple of times, as the young woman didn’t always agree with the pronouncements of the older woman (such as about the main problem caused by cattle!) Fortunately, none of us disagreed about climate change as an issue, so it was all good! Then at breakfast, we dined with a couple, roughly our age like the Danes, who were from Merced, California. She was an elementary school teacher and he a retired fire chief. Conversation centred mostly around teaching, and California.

In the Parlour Car, Len spied (or heard) some German speakers, and ended up having a conversation with them. One was from Munich, the other from Frankfurt, and they were with a Japanese woman. Turns out they’d all been to some family reunion in Hawaii and were now having a holiday before returning home. Len enjoyed practising his German, and acquitted himself pretty well, as far as I could tell.

We only walked 4kms (for obvious reasons!)

Wrapping up Seattle 

Since we’ve now left Seattle, we thought to add a few observations, starting with what a great place it is to visit (and we don’t think this is entirely coloured by the gorgeous weather we had.) It’s a very walkable city, even though quite hilly in places. There are also many public transport options, which can be a bit overwhelming at first. What do you use to go where? It’s an active city – people run, cycle and walk dogs, everywhere! It’s not all roses though: homeless people are prevalent everywhere you go. Very sad.

Overall, a week was barely enough.

Seattle is a fast growing city. Phil told us that something like 1100 people are moving there a week! It’s become quite the technology hub. I read that Seattle, with San Jose, San Francisco, and Austin, are called the “four tech hubs.” We mentioned previously the big companies which started, or are based, in Seattle.  I should have included a much older one, the upper-end department store, Nordstrom, established in 1901. But, many more companies are now setting up big offices there, including Airbnb, Uber, Apple, Facebook, Google and Expedia. It’s clearly a critical mass thing, but some Seattleites don’t like it much, like the woman I met on Alki Beach who was pleased I liked the place but said, only partly lightheartedly, “don’t tell anyone”. Cities can grow too fast!

Another thing we noticed was that PayWave (or what we think Americans  call “tap”) is little used. PINs and, more frequently than that, signatures are still the go. When a Bainbridge Island shopkeeper asked me to sign for a $14 purchase, I said (in the manner of small-talk) that we don’t need to sign or PIN for items of that small amount in Australia. She replied that “Everything’s better in Australia”! “Oh, I didn’t mean that”, I replied, “we don’t have everything right!” I think she realised I was not big-noting Australia. She was simply reflecting, she said, the various things she’d heard about Australia.

We were also intrigued by the ubiquitous warning so far (ie not just in Seattle) on menus, stating that “Consuming raw or undercooked meats, poultry, seafood, shellfish or eggs may increase your risk of foodborne illness.” If a restaurant serves rare or medium-rare steak, they give this warning. If they serve sashimi, they do so too! And so on. Is this another example of our Western nanny-state mentality?

Finally, we had an interesting discussion with Rosemary regarding equity, and the Washington state government, particularly concerning education and teachers. Apparently, the state’s Supreme Court ruled that the government was violating its own constitution requiring it to “fully fund” education by underfunding the state school system. Of course, the question being negotiated is what does “fully fund” mean. Part of the issue relates to teacher salaries and equity. It’s complex, and includes the differential role played by county taxes/levies in teacher salaries. I love that the issue of supporting education and of equity is treated so importantly – it speaks well of the state’s values – but, how to resolve it? (If you want to read more about it, check out this article).

Today’s trivia

Amtrak was created by Congress in 1970 to take over the intercity passenger rail services previously operated, at a loss for many years, by private railroad companies in the United States.

Today’s images

Stills

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Moving

Len’s choice, not mine!