HOW I MISSED THE BOAT IN SAN FRANCISCO
By H. Martin Swan
On June 20th I boarded #27 at Saint Paul (the Portland section of the Empire Builder) for a long awaited, long planned trip to attend the National Convention of the NRHS in Sacramento, which was run in conjunction with Railfair. I was going as the Northstar chapter representative on the NRHS's Board of Directors, as the Director of Emblem Sales for the NRHS, and as a pure tourist for me, myself and I.
The Empire Builder is a nice train. Others must think so as it was packed. Being in the Portland sleeper, in order to get to the dining car, I had to traverse the two Portland coaches, the lounge and the two Seattle coaches--a long walk for somebody with sore knees. As we all know the first day's scenery is somewhat minimal, but as evening approached anticipation grew and at last the mountains could be seen--as this was the longest day of the year. I expected to be able to see parts of the route that I hadn't seen since the old Western Star was discontinued. I went into the lounge car that had been empty all day and was startled to hear the familiar sounds of "Ding dong the witch is Dead the mean ol' witch....." Amazing, we just hit the mountains and they decide to put on a movie that appealed to children. I found a seat and was given dirty looks by people bringing their children to the lounge to see the movie. For the next hour or two I have some beautiful mountain scenery with "We're off to see the Wizard, the wonderful Wizard of OZ" playing in the background. Why oh why oh why does Amtrak insist on putting on movies at the most inconceivable times.
After awhile, as it finally got dark, I went to bed so I could get up early to see the Columbia River Gorge. Arrival time at Portland was right on the dot. I put on my Director of Emblem Sales hat and went out to OSI to see about obtaining some NRHS jackets for future sales.
Next was the Coast Starlight. I had been waiting to ride this train for a very long time. It arrived early in Portland and sleeping car passengers from the Portland Metropolitan Lounge were boarded first. I made a beeline to the Pacific Parlor Car. What a wonderful car! About a dozen large overstuffed parlor type seats that turned, then tables that would hold perhaps another 24 or so. The biggest problem with the Parlor Car was that there wasn't enough seats for everybody who wanted to come in. "George" was the car attendant and man did he work. He was everywhere including coming to my seat, taking my drink order and bringing it to me--something that hasn't happened to me since before Amtrak. We also had our wine tasting party in which I was given 1/3 glass of four types of wine (bottles for sale if you wished) and told to note the delicate flavor of the apples and peaches in the body of the liquid etc, etc. I don't know; they tasted like Ripple to me. But afterwards the car got kind of noisy as people were laughing and having one whee of a good time.
Returning to my room I was surprised to find that Bill Specht, Director of Gulf Coast Chapter, NRHS was sitting in the room across from mine. Bill lives in Houston and had flown to Seattle so he could ride the Coast Starlight. This is the third trip out of four that Bill has been on the same train with me.
During the night we lost an hour so instead of arriving Sacramento at a very early 6:10 am we arrived at 7:10 am. (Note: we left Marysville 2 hours down but there is a one hour pad in the schedule from Marysville to Sacramento.) Plenty of time to have the tasty continental breakfast set up for sleeping car passengers in the Parlor Car.
Something needs to be done with the Sacramento station. The train unloaded us away from the depot so I had to carry my 3 carry-on bags (including my camera bag) from the side of the train, 10 miles to a underground tunnel, 2 miles through the tunnel and then 4 miles to the depot. My luggage in total was very heavy and it sure seemed like that was the distance I had to go. There were no Red Caps and there were no luggage carts (those I found later under lock and key near the baggage room). And I found out later that there was no air-conditioning in the station. The Wednesday steam trip with 844 was suppose to be leaving at about 8:30 am but there was no sign of the train. I hopped a cab and went up to the Hotel where I was told I had to wait until 3:00 p.m. before I could check in.
The temperature was steadily rising--in fact it hit 97 degrees. My cousin came along to drive me to Benicia to visit my Uncle and Aunt whom I hadn't seen since 1968. Her car was not air-conditioned! Later, after we returned to Sacramento I bought her a ticket to see Railfair. I only spent one hour there. I saw the big steam but not the first generation diesels I had really wanted to see. My cousin was totally bored so we left. After we ate she dropped me off at the hotel, her duty done, and I spend an hour or so in the shower and then collapsed in bed. One thing about the Sacramento heat, it was a relatively dry heat and it cooled off to the mid-50's overnight.
The next day was my one and only trip of the Convention. The Amtrak trip to Oakland's Jack London Square using the old WP. I was down at the depot bright and early and as has happened on every trip so far, there was no train. So we waited and waited and waited. Finally in came our train. One GN full length Great Dome and an assortment of various type coaches. I was in coach #3. I had tried to get into the Dome car but it was sold out. Chapter member Doug Johnson had, however, managed to get in the Dome.
The car attendants were not there to open the door so we all went to the gallery car ahead of us and walked back to coach #3. Immediately upon departure our car host introduced himself. That job over he sat down and didn't move for the remainder of the trip. When I asked him a question he was downright rude--I guess I was disturbing him. The trip itself was fine. The most interesting sight was the mile after mile of windmill farms we passed through. When we got to Oakland 2hrs late, mass confusion reigned. Nobody was sure which way to go. We had been given written instructions on how to find Jack London Square, how to get to San Francisco and most importantly how to get back to the Amtrak station in Oakland. It soon became painfully obvious that the instructions were not given a test run to see how clear they were. They were most likely great for somebody who lived there and was familiar with the various quirks and pitfall of the area. They were completely inadequate for a visitor to the area. Because of those instructions we missed the ferry back to Oakland by 10 seconds--they slammed the gate shut in our face. We would have made it "if we had only known....." Then trying to work our way back to Oakland on BART became a comedy of frustration as we tried to make sense out of those %%@@/`*&@$/`%&* instructions.
Once back to the Amtrak station we boarded our train, again through the gallery car since our car attendants couldn't be bothered to open the vestibule doors for us. The trip back was a fast non-stop on Amtrak's normal route.
Friday, I first put on my Director of Emblem Sales hat and spent my morning selling the merchandise of the NRHS. At 1:00 pm I put my member of the Board of Director's hat on and represented Northstar Chapter at the Summer BOD, then back to selling. That evening was the Banquet which is the one time at the Convention that the attendees dress up, which for the men usually indicated coat and tie. The speaker was Jim Larson, retired Amtrak executive who talked about his youth and his early days working for the C&NW. It was very interesting.
Alas the too quick week was nearly over. A friend dropped me off at the depot at 10:30 pm to catch the Northbound Coast Starlight scheduled to depart at 11:59 pm. That time came and went and went and went and went. To give credit where credit is due, Amtrak personnel constantly kept giving us updates as to the train. It had got caught behind an UP freight that had broken down. The air was cool and they had outdoor benches near the tracks so I waited out there. Eventually at 2:00 am the train came in.
Our very good porter got us on and told us to go to bed, instruction I obeyed most willingly. However, I was up 3 hours later so I could see Mt. Shasta, which is usually passed in the dark. Our train got later and later until it was down 4 hrs. I only had a 1 hour connection in Portland. It was finally announced that those of us connecting to #28 would be bussed from Eugene to Spokane. This was somewhat disappointing, but it was tempered with Amtrak's very generous sleeping car refund. Since we wouldn't be able to use our sleeping cars from Eugene to Portland and Portland to Spokane, Amtrak refunded the LOCAL rate from Eugene to Portland etc. That worked out to a 100% refund of my Sacramento to Portland sleeping car fare and about 49% of the Portland to St. Paul fare. Nice for the pocketbook but especially the Eugene to Portland segments, perhaps a bit overly generous.
There were 54 of us making the connection and Amtrak had chartered two very nice tourist buses with window glass curving into the ceiling. There was enough room that anybody who wanted a whole seat was able to obtain one. Arrival in Spokane was at 12:30 am and we tied the train that was also just arriving. Into bed at 1:30 am and up again at 4:30 am to see the mountains. After we left Glacier Park I went back to my room and collapsed. Arrival the next morning was 20 minutes early and my summer trip was over.
Notes:
SLEEP: What sleep? I ain't got time to sleep! I was up between 4:30 and 6:00 am every morning except the first night out to either see the scenery or to attend Convention activities. The ride on the Empire Builder and the Coast Starlight was very smooth except Fargo to Minot where the track does not receive the same attention as the rest of the trackage we went over.
FOOD: The food on Amtrak has improved immensely over the last few years. The menu selection has not. The Empire Builder had the same menu coming and going. For dinner that was the usual Strip Steak, Chicken Kiev, or Broiled Salmon. The salmon was very good. The Coast Starlight had 6 menu items plus the "special". Their menu was different in each direction. The only supper I had on that train was the "pot roast". It was so good that afterwards in the Parlor Car, people were actually raving about it--no kidding. In Sacramento I had an omelet in the Hotel with Monterey jack cheese, thick cut bacon and an avocado. Different! (I feel sorry for people who only eat at places like Perkin's and never try anything unusual.) In Old Sacramento I ate at a place called the Veranda--a second story eating establishment with an outside balcony--just the place to get a cooling breeze in the evening. One night I had lamb chops and the other night I had baked half chicken with brandied cranberry sauce.
THE CONVENTION: The Convention had its problems. Most of the trains didn't run anywhere near their schedule. The UP made a last minute substitution of a dirty diesel for steam on the much anticipated Saturday trip to the Keddie Wye. This, of course was not the fault of the Convention. However, the written instructions I received were horrible and the car attendants I observed (and were told about on the two UP trips) primary function was to get a free ride and place themselves in position to get the best photo opportunities. Friends told me that they had to fight their way around the car hosts just to try to get a picture. This was not universal; Doug Johnson in the first class section advised that his car hosts were hard working and tried to accommodate everyone. I did feel the Convention was lacking in hospitality.
OVERVIEW: I had a wonderful time!