# Coast Starlight and Empire Builder



## Rob_C (Feb 16, 2009)

Okay, so this trip started off as some business and a chance to relax and vacation on the way there. There being Pasco Washington, site of this years out-of-control Radcon! (named for the nuclear reactor in nearby Richland, WA.)

Travel time was short for this trip so a return on Amtrak wasn't possible, and as you'll see we cut corners where we could.

My traveling companion and I have done the Coast Starlight from Los Angeles a few times already. We've seen the coast, we've been jostled around on the coast line tracks that are finally getting some much-needed maintenance from UP. And we've spent the day on the train getting from Los Angeles to the bay area.

So we decided to skip that part of the trip this time. Also since we were flying back into Burbank Airport, the Burbank Airport Train Station (BUR) made a lot of sense as a starting point.

We arrived about 20 minutes before the scheduled Bakersfield Bus connection to San Joaquin train 703 at Burbank Station around 3pm. That way we both got a good half day or more of work done that would otherwise be taken up if we had been on the Coast Starlight that morning.

We watched a Metrolink 5 car train with an F59PHI come through right behind us before the bus was officially late. It ended up being only 5 minutes or so late, but in the chilly wind that is so uncommon to Southern California the bus was a sign for sore eyes!

Off we go on the first leg of our trip on a bus! My first time on an Ambus, so we sat in the front. Only five other people rode this bus to Bakersfield, two from LAX, us, and one other we picked up at the train station in Newhell.

The bus driver deftly avoided afternoon rush hour traffic better than I could and soon we were in the open country north of Los Angeles. It wasn't long before snow started to creep up along the sides of The Five (Interstate 5 for those not familiar with our penchant for giving freeways personality.)

This is the first time I'd seen or gone through snow in the Tejon Pass region and it lingered through to the grapevine before disappearing as we descended into Bakersfield as the day changed to twilight.

We pulled into BFD about an hour before departure. This gave me a chance to snap a photo of the train as the sun was setting and we had some vending machine snacks. The train was powered by an F59PHI and had five coaches. The last cab car was closed off.

When the boarding call came, we headed on over where people with no sense of temperature had been waiting around in 30 degree weather for them to open up the cars. The conductor was a cheerful plump fellow. He seemed to enjoy telling us and others his rules about not using laptops on the train unless we were using it for space invaders.

We got underway on time and enjoyed watching the wifi signals pop in and out on our computers before switching over to local apps. The train was pretty light tonight and people were stretched out at tables. We headed to the lounge/cafe car. This is a strange car imho. The conductors hung out downstairs, and upstairs has the cafe and tables and booths that seemed to be the inspiration for the CCC. Decorative lights and fake plants add a strange ambiance to the car. The seats didn't look terribly comfortable and the lighting on these trains is waay too bright imho, but yet there was something that made you want to hang out in this car like a lounge, it's obvious intended purpose, but no one did. It was empty except for snack purchases the entire trip!

The lady at the cafe counter was nice and efficient. I asked the conduction "Hot dog, pizza, or pizza?" He said to go for the burger which was pretty good for a nuked burger. And I mean NUKED. They nuke the heck out of these things because they did the same thing on the Empire Builder. The nuke it so much the bun gets wrinkled and the whole things has a bit of a rubbery texture. Taste was fine and it did the job, but seems like if they are running some trains with convention ovens it might be possible to reheat them that way for a better overall presentation.

Later on headed back for another drink and cookie. The cookie wasn't very good.

We got held up outside of Fresno for another train and was ready to start complaining about BNSF until a southbound Amtrak rolled by. Time was made up into Stockton where we stopped at a new depot that is apparently very short because only the first car was detrained. Why not just use the ACE station?

Lights of Sacramento were nice to see as we pulled in on the east side of the city and jogged west into SAC more or less on time.

We went into the station as directed, briefly tried and failed to get on wifi before hearing a very MUFFLED and impossible to understand message over the PA about the Coast Starlight, something about, "garble inbound Coast Starlight... garble... baggage... garble ... passengers... garble". So of course everyone heads out to the track.

We knew better, but being in a nearly empty station with a train to catch made us antsy so we went out with the other idiots to wait in the 33 degree temperature and it had started to rain.

The trains arrival time came and went. After about 10 minutes headlights approached. Ahah! Finally!

We had moved up the platform to where I anticipated sleepers would stop and about the time the train reached the coach passengers it let out a very loud and un-Amtrak sounding horn! Was a very long and very fast moving freight! Hadn't been right next to a freight on a platform moving by that fast before and it definitely added to the wind chill factor! lol

More headlights a few minutes later, turns out it was just our 703 headed to the yard! By now we were all cursing the lousy PA in the station.

Eventually 14 did turn up.

Consist was two P42's back to back, baggage, 3 sleepers including the t-dorm, ppc, diner, lounge and three coaches.

The sleeper attendant was gruffly telling coach passengers where to go, assumed we were coach passengers because we're not older or otherwise look like we have income and promptly told us to go to the back of the train before we could convince him we were indeed sleeper passengers! Grrr!

Found our room, stowed bags and were much to wired to just hit the hay. We knew stuff would be closed, but decided to tour the non-revenue cars anyway. PPC was empty, diner was empty and people from coach had already staked out places to sleep on the floor of the SSL. I get that not everybody can sleep at 45 degrees, but seriously. That's why we got a room. Amtrak needs to enforce this because there is something really offputting about people sleeping in public areas when the train is only 3/4 full. I'd seen it before on a packed Coast Starlight years ago and I'm not going to never ride a train again because of it, but a lot of people would. Amtrak needs to address this imho.

Headed downstairs in the lounge where some (I assume railfans) were hanging out. Not much going on, so we headed back to the room. Before we got their our car attendant stopped us and asked in a somewhat "why are you out and about right now?" sort of way, "Did you find your room okay?" lol

I figured he had a hard day and it was late, so made up something and said goodnight.

That ends day one! Didn't take too many pictures, but I did get some interesting video. Will post that and day 2 next!

Overall - Amtrak 703 is really a great idea for those wishing to save time. The bus ride went by quickly and wasn't bad at all. Crew was good and friendly. Wished we could see something outside the brightly lit train this time of year, but all we saw was stations and crossings. Food was acceptable, even good for what it was. Coast Starlight delay was not too bad, but they really need to fix the PA in SAC!

Rob


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## Rob_C (Feb 17, 2009)

Day 2

We didn't sleep much during the night as the Starlight made tracks across the Sacramento valley. By the time we reached Dunsmuir we were mostly back on time.

As I mentioned in another thread, the Dunsmuir box canyon and ascent along the west side of Mt. Shasta is spectacular and usually missed in darkness north or southbound. The best bet is a late northbound. (which we were not on this trip). We did have the benefit of a full moon and my memory of google maps helped fill in a lot of the blanks. The train crosses the Sacramento river over and over in the box canyon, many tunnels and is fairly speed restricted. Dunsmuir is a quaint little stop at 5-something am. I believe this town used to sport a lot of rail activity as they added helpers for the grade up Shasta. More river-skiping north of Dunsmuir before the train enters a giant horseshoe curve and ascends a steep side of the canyon. As Huell Howser would say, "that's amazing!".

Even more so, Mt. Shasta was visible in the pre-dawn blackness thanks to the moonlight reflecting off its snow-capped peak. I briefly tried to get some shots with my video camera's night vision mode, but the infrared light just reflects back on the glass.

I napped a little bit as the train downgraded towards Klamath Falls and enters an unusual tree-less area in northern California. The sun started to come up as we neared the Oregon border and the train crew enthusiastically tried to get people into the diner proclaiming, "that bacon he's cooking up in the diner sure smells good!" I had to roll my eyes a little knowing it was SDS, but it seemed to work as more people showed up to the diner just as we got there.

I had the breakfast special which was an egg and ham grilled sandwich. It was good, though I find most breakfasts on Amtrak a little dry, be it eggs, french toast, or other. (lack of moisture in anything). But definitely could not complain. Pretty good sized portion too. My companion had the scrambled eggs which he said they were lousy. The omelette was something with capers so nobody at the table ordered that. Why put something with an obscure ingredient on the menu anyway?

As we headed back through the PPC to our sleeper we met the PPC attendant for the first time who immediately accused us of being coach passengers in the wrong place! Jeans and a sweater is apparently a sign of a coach passenger? We had a fantastic PPC attendant a year ago, great jovial guy, the crew (as you'll see) on this Starlight just wasn't quite there. The people in the diner went from making an attempt, to grumpyness and back. Tipping was average as a result.

Snow. It started snowing just north of Klamath Falls and there had been snow on the ground since just outside of Redding. This country was even more gorgeous with snow on the ground. We ran to the sleeper and got the video camera and headed for the last car of the train hoping to duplicate something like



However it was not to be as the back window wasn't in the best shape and had a lot of whipped up snow.

Strolling back to the SSL we decided to sit in the swivel chairs with the larger windows in the SSL. Scenery was excellent! Passengers in the SSL seemed a bit ambivalent about it though and most were in their coach seats. The lounge was maybe half full. A lounge door that wouldn't shut might have had something to do with it I guess, though I didn't think it was that cold. Later the PPC had the same problem. Not sure how that happens.

We stopped in Chemult then began the ascent towards Willamette Pass. There was a small work crew at the summit, possibly digging out a switch? At least some of the tracks hadn't seen service in a few days/ hours as they had a fair amount of snow obscuring them. As we began our descent I decided to take advantage of the lack of a, "Warning, do not open window unless there is an emergency" signs downstairs. Our sleeper didn't have one, so I had plausible deniability! Opened that puppy up and started filming as we went around turns.

Note on the sleeper: Our was the "George M. Pullman" (I think). I wasn't aware they still name these cars but overall it was in pretty good shape, probably a refurb. After missing a few good shots, and tiring of lining up a shot and not having a curve anywhere in sight I decided to stop trying my luck and headed back to the room to try to nap.

Apparently that worked as the next thing I remember was the stop in Eugene, OR. From there things got bumpier and faster up the valley before we had our first real snag. Stopped for a UP work crew for all of about 10 minutes. The crew was very good about announcing this stuff. Our now really grumpy sleeper attendant came around to get lunch reservations which he complained about having to do. I suggested we do the parlor car for variety and he said, "That pasta sucks!".

I agreed completely (to his credit for honesty, but I'm not sure that's the way I'd broach it!!) and politely pointed out I was going to have the salad instead. I then added the ppc pasta sucked a year ago when I was on the Starlight and asked why they hadn't changed it. He rolled his eyes and said, "That's Amtrak." Again, points for honesty, but the attitude was a downer. Net result to the tip, basically no change. I re-iterated I'd probably just have the salad and he insisted there was more variety in the diner. Rather than argue further we opted for the diner. As it turns out that led to one of the best meals all around.

We got to the diner for our 1:45 (more like 1:30 as they called us early) and were told we could sit two to the table which is always nice. The smaller crowd seemed to have the diner crew in better spirits. I *think* we were even offered dessert) though we did play a little chicken to see if they would ask us or if we'd have to. Ordering the vanilla ice cream and chocolate cake (decadent cake I think they call it) is fantastic and then split the two.

Heading back to the room we read and listened to music until the train pulled into PDX on time.

As I detrained I thanked the car attendant and gave him two $5 bills. Not sure if he didn't see the second five or what but he gave me a dirty look.

We walked over to the trolly stop and didn't have to wait long for the ride across the bridge to the convention center stop followed by a brisk walk to the La Quinta.

Headed back over to downtown for dinner, (very cold!) around 9pm and found a place that was still open. Did more drinking than eating as the portions were of the "large price, large plate, small portion" variety and then headed back for bed.

Overall a pretty nice day.

End of day 2!


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## Rob_C (Feb 17, 2009)

Day 3!

We weren't taking the Empire Builder very far, but I was still excited as I hadn't taken this train before.

And in the mean time we had picked up two more traveling companions, both new to Amtrak. Both flew into PDX to join us for the train, one from Canada, the other also from LA.

We met the first in the morning with plans to stroll around Portland. First stop was the Old Town Pizza, highly recommended. It was pretty good, but what stood out more than the food was the fun atmosphere and cool people that worked there.

You find a seat, then go order which may put off some, but worked very well for us. We had the place mostly to ourselves and the staff was of course curious where we were from and what we were doing lugging around science fiction gear for a convention. They took some silly photos of us and then tried to give us directions to a doughnut place we never did find. Instead we found was was to be our second stop anyway, Powell's books.

*huge* doesn't begin to describe Powells! They even had a bag check for us. And every topic, category you can imagine kept us busy for a couple hours. It also meant our bags were several pounds heavier lugging back to the station!

But lug we did, and after losing track of time we arrived back at PDX with about 10 minutes to spare before boarding was called. Met our fourth at the station and queued up for the Empire Builder. The CS had also arrived in time for the connection like the day before and I hear this may be a guaranteed connection very soon. Frankly I'm glad we took the day. I was ready for a real bed and a break from travel anyway and it affords a chance to see something so the extra day was nice.

As we got out to the tracks we were asked our destination, and told to go to the last coach. That was until a control freak started yelling at people, "No coach passengers beyond me!" at the door of the first coach. We all lined up until someone came along and set him right that our destinations were down. The person in front of me said Pasco and he waved them on to the next car. I went to follow and he practically grabbed me to demand my destination. It was just off putting that we didn't need to be corralled so forcefully. The conductor was a bit more pleasant taking tickets and making sure people were sitting in the right spot/cars, etc.

We hadn't gone far before we were stopped for 10 minutes by a drawbridge. Light was fading quickly, but we did see for about 30 minutes past Vancouver, WA and glimpses could be had for about an hour. I definitely want to see the Columbia River during the day sometime by train. Shot some video out the front window going through the drawbridge and general scenery from the lounge where we planted ourselves at a booth for the majority of the trip. The lounge was pretty sparsely used, mostly us, railroad vets, and the short visits by people on food hunts and the occasional family.

We had nuked food for dinner. The burger tasted the same as the one on 703 of course super NUKED! They ran out of burgers very fast and most people got the hot dog until those ran out. Apparently they stock the EB from Chicago and what's left from the westbound goes back east without any reinforcement. For the only food service on a train that travels during a dinner hour, it seems ill planned. But again, the food was decent.

The friends new to Amtrak seemed to have a good time. One really had a problem with the "turbulance" as he called it of the ride having just come off a plane. There were more switches (which seem to be the case of most turbulance) along the Columbia river than I would have guessed. Some of the worst track I've been on I think was the UP coast Sub before they started working on it. Between LA and Fullerton can also be kinda gnarly with all the industrial sidings. I would rate this section of BNSF somewhere in the middle. The BNSF up the San Joaquin Valley was some of the best track I think I've ever been on with Amtrak (except for parts of the NEC). Very smooth running. But it was interesting getting the perspective from a new Amtrak rider that didn't know what to expect. The poor guy was so out of it by the time we got to Pasco he split his pants in the ladies room at the Pasco station! Funny story to tell for years to come!

That ends our rail journey. Should have some pictures from various parties soon, and I want to put together a little highlights for youtube with some of the out-the-lower-level window footage. Will post when I do.

Overall can't complain. I wish I could sleep on a train, but will note for future the importance of stop offs to compensate and breaks from time on the train to make the trip more enjoyable all around. I think I will mention a few things to Amtrak, specifically the sleeping policy in the SSL, and lack of stock on the EB. The staff ranged from excellent to poor. Being in their shoes, I'm not sure I could do much better, but service is something Amtrak can always improve on, and the fact that some of them are outstanding shows me that at least Amtrak is trying. I'm not sure it's enough for mainstream travelers, but if we can get either of the newbs back on the train sometime it would be a good sign of future potential.

Rob


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## wayman (Feb 17, 2009)

Rob,

Nice report! Over on the east coast, I was also riding Amtrak to and from an SF convention this weekend (from Philadelphia to Boston for Boskone) 

Powell's is amazing. I actually prefer it by far to The Strand (which New Yorkers will insist is the best bookstore ever, simply because most of them have never been to Powell's). Glad you had some time to explore and enjoy Portland.

I'm a bit dismayed to hear how gruff your sleeping and PPC attendants were in their assumptions you were traveling coach just based on appearance  Asking you if you're in the right place is one thing, immediately accusing you of being on the wrong place is quite another.


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## Rob_C (Feb 19, 2009)

Video is up on



Enjoy,

Rob


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