News of Amtrak’s derailment in Montana hit a little too close to home. My guy and I took the same route and train – the Empire Builder – to Seattle during summer.
Lots of random thoughts have emerged.
How fortunate that the accident didn’t happen during winter, a rainstorm or scorching heat. The remote location – near Joplin, population 200 and 30 miles from the Canadian border – temporarily stranded passengers and crew on an otherwise calm, mild day.
The incident, which killed three and injured around one-third of the others, happened during afternoon. Can’t help but wonder how darkness and sleeping passengers would have affected the accident scene and extent of injuries.
We booked an Amtrak roomette because of trip length (around 39 hours from Columbus, Wis., to Seattle) and the option to remove face masks while in our private compartment, which had big windows.
Picture a little chamber with a windowed door too, and two cushioned seats that face each other. Dimensions: 3.5 feet by 6.5 feet. A porter fully reclines and adds linens to the seats at night, to create a twin-size bed, and pulls out a second, narrower frame to create an upper berth.
That top bunk with an oh-so-thin and hard mattress was all mine. It came with sturdy netting that hooked onto the bed’s edge, to prevent falling out during toss-and-turn slumber or a harsh train stop.
Not an easy climb in and out, even during average circumstances. Not a good match for the less agile, or claustrophobics, because of the small space between top bed and railcar ceiling. Wouldn’t have wanted to be up there during a derailment.
That said, I slept better than expected during our trip – mainly because of daytime naps – and would recommend train travel to others. Researchers say trains are safer than motor vehicle travel.
For much of the ride, passengers have no choice but to unplug because of a lack of Internet and cell service. That’s a good thing because it forces us to unwind, relax and pay attention to changing landscapes.
We look up from reading or cat naps to see amber waves of grain fill the horizon. Steers shuffle, single file, along a muddy riverside with no fences. A bald eagle swoops over the Mississippi.
Clusters of oil wells come and go, as do grazing deer near sunset and tunnels through mountains. We see fields of bright yellow rapeseed. Junkyards and rural poverty. Lone fishermen casting.
These glimpses usually last mere seconds.
We hear snippets of life stories and share slivers of our own, especially during meals, which were included in our tickets to ride. A retiree was on a 50th anniversary trip without his wife – a long story. Young college professors flew from Indiana to Boston, because they wanted a cross-country rail experience.
A guy who wore an Amtrak T-shirt traverses the U.S. by train often so he doesn’t have the stress of driving. An elderly couple said they sat hours while on a different train, after it hit a vehicle and dragged it one-half mile.
We wonder if a half dozen young Amish guys – all with similar haircuts as well as clothing – are off to new jobs, to visit relatives or to bring home wives. We eavesdrop on a man who travels 12 hours with his 17-year-old dog, breed unknown and great love apparent: The mutt is blind, deaf and has a bum leg but still seems to enjoy life.
If you value the stories, the scenery, the reflective pace and all the little realities of Americana, train travel remains the way to go. Like much of life, there are no guarantees of timeliness, complete comfort or anything else – but so it goes.
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Amtrak has a reputation for running late, but freight trains are legally obligated to give right of way to the passenger service’s trains. Freight trains travel slower and sometimes ignore the rule, Amtrak contends.
“Only the Department of Justice can enforce Amtrak’s right to preference over freight, and it has brought only one enforcement action against a freight company in Amtrak’s history – 40 years ago,” says the Amtrak.com blog.
During my experience, Amtrak arrived a little early to Seattle, our destination. En route, passengers occasionally were allowed to disembark, just for a few minutes. Our leg-stretching opportunities – coincidentally – included Havre and Shelby, Mont., stations on either side of where the September derailment occurred.
Watch Amtrak.com promotions before booking a trip. We latched onto a roomette during a two-ride-for-the-price-of-one promotion. One way was enough of a good thing; we decided to fly back home.
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If choosing Amtrak for long-distance travel again, I will wait for a promotion that allows me to hop on and off for one flat fee. I will book a seat, not a roomette or larger bedroom.
Then I’ll divide the train schedule into manageable chunks and disembark for a day or two, here and there. On the Empire Builder, I’d maybe overnight in St. Paul, Minn.; Glacier National Park in Montana (a park lodge is next to the tracks); and Leavenworth, Wash., before ending in Seattle.
Why Leavenworth, population 2,375? Architecture, food, music and gift shops adhere to an Old World Bavarian theme – which makes it a charming place to explore.
The Cascade Mountains village, on the Wenatchee River, is into downhill skiing in winter and river tubing in summer. We arranged a short cab ride from train station to downtown, ahead of our arrival, and stayed at the Bavarian Lodge – where we could walk to natural and manmade attractions. leavenworth.org, bavarian-lodge.com