Devil's Advocate
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Sunset Limited (SAS > ELP)
Various Random Thoughts On My Trip Through West Texas & 1st Deluxe BR
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The cab I called must have been right around the corner because he showed up quicker than I'd ever seen before. As a result we arrived at the station with plenty of time to retrieve my ticket and board, which is kind of rare for me. Normally with early morning trains and planes I seem to arrive with the absolute minimum amount of time left before boarding. I paid the taxi driver the mandated $40 fee for roughly ten minutes of quick and easy driving. Normally I'd prefer to drive myself or be dropped off but with zero parking spots at a station I have to reach at five in the morning I simply have to take what I can get. I got out and took a look around an increasingly familiar scene. The Sunset Limited was pointed south on the first track and the Eagle was on the second track. I'm guessing Amtrak is responsible for maintaining these two tracks because they look really bad compared to the well maintained mainline tracks right next to them. That probably explains why Amtrak trains never seem to go faster than three miles per hour over these two tracks.
After seeing all the unstaffed locations in the Amtrak station database website and reading comments from folks who don't live anywhere near a station of any sort, SAS suddenly seems a lot busier than it used to. We have two distinct routes heading in three directions with at least one train resting here for a few hours every single night, and that's not too shabby for an intermediary stop. There were some folks milling about and some passengers hurrying into the station to get their bags checked. I have no idea why people pack so much stuff but maybe Amtrak's generous luggage policies are part of what brings them to the train. For me half the fun of being on vacation is seeing how little you really need to carry around with you. I try to start small and stay small and I never begin a trip with more than a standard issue roll-aboard and a laptop bag, including on international trips. As I was walking inside I tried to help a lady get through the door but her luggage kept falling off her cart. After she was through the door I walked over to the QuikTrak kiosk and got my tickets.
There were reservations for both the coach and sleeper that I could choose from. The kiosk doesn't tell you which ticket has the sleeper compartment until you've already selected it, but thanks to the differing train numbers I was able to figure it out beforehand. After I had my ticket I started walking all the way down to the very last car. Along my way I had an SCA check my ticket followed by a slightly concerned looking conductor . I guess he thought I might be lost or something. I'm not much of a morning person so I can certainly understand that assumption. He took my ticket and returned my stub and I continued walking. The last car is at the end of our full-length platform just before a busy grade crossing. This car has become my mainstay of late. I seriously thought about going coach, but with the trains so full these days I figured I wouldn't have much space to myself and so I went ahead and got the sleeper. I also remembered my last trip where the coach car had a really funky smell for the bulk of my ride. Being in a sleeper room seemed to give me more options should something unfortunate occur. The full bedroom was cheaper than the roomette when I snagged it. It felt a little weird to be taking up this much space with just one person. I think it's pretty nice but probably not worth the usual cost on this route.
I went for breakfast in our traditional diner car about an hour after departure and was promptly seated next to two very lively ladies with an elderly man soon joining us. Up to this point the staff had been doing pretty well in my book. The conductor was professional and the SCA was friendly and helpful. But the dining car is where things tend to head South for me and this trip was no exception. I was disappointed by our slow and forgetful waiter. He seemed too old and too frail to be doing a waiter's job and it required repeated attempts to get his absent-minded attention or jog his memory about even simple requests. You could hear him trying to think through his job aloud. He may not be a bad guy, but this job was way over his head. On the plus side I was pretty amused by the surprisingly negative topics my breakfast club was discussing. All about diseases and death, first thing in the morning. Over all it was a nice group of generally chatty people who had fairly different views from mine but who didn't take any of it too seriously. The food was pretty generic as usual. It tasted like a fancier version of McDonald's to my palate. Nothing to get excited about and not very healthy but I paid for it and the conversation made up for it somewhat. After breakfast I went back to my room and promptly fell asleep.
As we approached Del Rio somebody started a long dissertation about the stop on the PA. I have visited Del Rio before and I can assure you that nothing about this town warrants a long and rambling announcement. I turned off the PA in my room but it still came in from the speakers outside. Shortly thereafter a family in the compartment next door started making a lot of noise. I don't think their kids had learned about the "indoor voice" concept yet. I was really tempted to ask them to be quiet or at least shut the door but then I got caught up listening to their weird and dysfunctional dialog. I don't normally listen to family bickering but I guess my half-awake state made it seem slightly more interesting than usual. We arrived in Del Rio and I used the restroom in my room for the first time. It's certainly convenient but not really necessary when you have other restrooms in the same car. Shortly after Del Rio we got stuck behind some slow moving freight. Nothing more than twenty miles per hour until Malvado according to the DD's and even after we got the all clear on the scanner we were stuck in the forties for a long time after that. That did not bode well for an ontime arrival. But it did slow everything down to give us a really good look at the oddly blooming desert. All the recent rains had turned the desert into a huge field of purple flowers. It was the wettest, greenest, and purplest I'd ever seen this stretch of scenery.
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More to follow. Maybe.
Various Random Thoughts On My Trip Through West Texas & 1st Deluxe BR
-----------------
The cab I called must have been right around the corner because he showed up quicker than I'd ever seen before. As a result we arrived at the station with plenty of time to retrieve my ticket and board, which is kind of rare for me. Normally with early morning trains and planes I seem to arrive with the absolute minimum amount of time left before boarding. I paid the taxi driver the mandated $40 fee for roughly ten minutes of quick and easy driving. Normally I'd prefer to drive myself or be dropped off but with zero parking spots at a station I have to reach at five in the morning I simply have to take what I can get. I got out and took a look around an increasingly familiar scene. The Sunset Limited was pointed south on the first track and the Eagle was on the second track. I'm guessing Amtrak is responsible for maintaining these two tracks because they look really bad compared to the well maintained mainline tracks right next to them. That probably explains why Amtrak trains never seem to go faster than three miles per hour over these two tracks.
After seeing all the unstaffed locations in the Amtrak station database website and reading comments from folks who don't live anywhere near a station of any sort, SAS suddenly seems a lot busier than it used to. We have two distinct routes heading in three directions with at least one train resting here for a few hours every single night, and that's not too shabby for an intermediary stop. There were some folks milling about and some passengers hurrying into the station to get their bags checked. I have no idea why people pack so much stuff but maybe Amtrak's generous luggage policies are part of what brings them to the train. For me half the fun of being on vacation is seeing how little you really need to carry around with you. I try to start small and stay small and I never begin a trip with more than a standard issue roll-aboard and a laptop bag, including on international trips. As I was walking inside I tried to help a lady get through the door but her luggage kept falling off her cart. After she was through the door I walked over to the QuikTrak kiosk and got my tickets.
There were reservations for both the coach and sleeper that I could choose from. The kiosk doesn't tell you which ticket has the sleeper compartment until you've already selected it, but thanks to the differing train numbers I was able to figure it out beforehand. After I had my ticket I started walking all the way down to the very last car. Along my way I had an SCA check my ticket followed by a slightly concerned looking conductor . I guess he thought I might be lost or something. I'm not much of a morning person so I can certainly understand that assumption. He took my ticket and returned my stub and I continued walking. The last car is at the end of our full-length platform just before a busy grade crossing. This car has become my mainstay of late. I seriously thought about going coach, but with the trains so full these days I figured I wouldn't have much space to myself and so I went ahead and got the sleeper. I also remembered my last trip where the coach car had a really funky smell for the bulk of my ride. Being in a sleeper room seemed to give me more options should something unfortunate occur. The full bedroom was cheaper than the roomette when I snagged it. It felt a little weird to be taking up this much space with just one person. I think it's pretty nice but probably not worth the usual cost on this route.
I went for breakfast in our traditional diner car about an hour after departure and was promptly seated next to two very lively ladies with an elderly man soon joining us. Up to this point the staff had been doing pretty well in my book. The conductor was professional and the SCA was friendly and helpful. But the dining car is where things tend to head South for me and this trip was no exception. I was disappointed by our slow and forgetful waiter. He seemed too old and too frail to be doing a waiter's job and it required repeated attempts to get his absent-minded attention or jog his memory about even simple requests. You could hear him trying to think through his job aloud. He may not be a bad guy, but this job was way over his head. On the plus side I was pretty amused by the surprisingly negative topics my breakfast club was discussing. All about diseases and death, first thing in the morning. Over all it was a nice group of generally chatty people who had fairly different views from mine but who didn't take any of it too seriously. The food was pretty generic as usual. It tasted like a fancier version of McDonald's to my palate. Nothing to get excited about and not very healthy but I paid for it and the conversation made up for it somewhat. After breakfast I went back to my room and promptly fell asleep.
As we approached Del Rio somebody started a long dissertation about the stop on the PA. I have visited Del Rio before and I can assure you that nothing about this town warrants a long and rambling announcement. I turned off the PA in my room but it still came in from the speakers outside. Shortly thereafter a family in the compartment next door started making a lot of noise. I don't think their kids had learned about the "indoor voice" concept yet. I was really tempted to ask them to be quiet or at least shut the door but then I got caught up listening to their weird and dysfunctional dialog. I don't normally listen to family bickering but I guess my half-awake state made it seem slightly more interesting than usual. We arrived in Del Rio and I used the restroom in my room for the first time. It's certainly convenient but not really necessary when you have other restrooms in the same car. Shortly after Del Rio we got stuck behind some slow moving freight. Nothing more than twenty miles per hour until Malvado according to the DD's and even after we got the all clear on the scanner we were stuck in the forties for a long time after that. That did not bode well for an ontime arrival. But it did slow everything down to give us a really good look at the oddly blooming desert. All the recent rains had turned the desert into a huge field of purple flowers. It was the wettest, greenest, and purplest I'd ever seen this stretch of scenery.
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More to follow. Maybe.
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