Planes, Trains and Automobiles - Day 2 (Chicago to Minnesota)

Another eerily empty space

As noted in the previous entry, my plans to drive a rental car from the suburbs (exurbs, really) to Union Station were thwarted by lack of availability of rental cars and the use of car service was dismissed because, well, I'm a tight-fisted accountant. And because there was another excellent alternative. Mom lives not to far from the last stop on a Metra commute rail line that happens to terminate at Union Station, as opposed to some of the other Metra lines that terminate at Ogilvie Transportation Center which is a few blocks from Union Station. So instead of paying $220-285 for car service, one of Mom's neighbors kindly offered to drive us to the train where we paid a whopping $16 for both of us to ride in air conditioned comfort. It took about 90 minutes as it made all stops since it was in the middle of the day, but was a convenient alternative. And it ended up dropping us off two tracks from the one where we would depart later on the Empire Builder.

Mom relaxing in the lounge

Our sleeping car tickets granted us access to the Metropolitan Lounge. While it doesn't have as many features as an airline lounge, it did have a few snacks, free wifi, and, most importantly, comfortable places to sit and clean bathrooms (always key). We found a quiet place on the second floor that was nearly empty (funny how everyone crams into places as soon as they get in the lounge and don't bother looking for more space) and camped there for about 90 minutes until it was time to board.

The Great Hall at Union Station

The boarding process was a bit chaotic. Initially, everyone queued in one rather long line and then a rather loud employee started pulling some people into a smaller line, but it wasn't clear to all what that was about. It turns out it was for those in sleeper cars, but it seemed odd that there weren't stanchions, ropes and signs indicating which line people should be in. But nevertheless we made it on board. Quite a few people had paper tickets but hadn't printed out the part with the bar code that was to be scanned in boarding, which slowed the process down. We had checked in on the app and so it had the bar code but, oddly, did not indicate which compartment was ours. She directed us to our car (there was only one sleeping car on the section of the train that went to Portland) where we experienced a rather old school process that somehow reminded me of summer camp -- the train car attendant looking us up on a printout on his clipboard. Car 2710, Roomette 9 it was!

The narrow hallway of our sleeper car

We lugged our suitcases up the stairs and onto the second level of the car and found our roomette. Um, it was smaller than expected. The Amtrak website is pretty bad in terms of showing videos of what to expect and so I had looked at various videos on YouTube to try and get a better sense of them. Well, many of them showed that the roomette had a small sink as well as a toilet that was, when the wooden lid was down, the lower of the two steps to the upper bunk. Now, query how awkward this might be if you're traveling with someone else and also whether the room might start to smell like a porta potty. But the convenience factor was undeniable. But our room did not have that. We had two very narrow stairs that somewhat doubled as storage/shelves during the day, but that was about it. There was not much legroom between the two seats facing each other, either, and neither of us are at all tall. There was a very narrow (maybe four inches) closet to hang things, but no room to store suitcases, so I had to lug them downstairs again. (We realized later that a normal size rollaboard could juuuuust squeeze underneath the seat, though it obviously would not be accessible when those seats were converted to a bed.) BUT with the door closed, we were allowed to take our masks off and breathe freely, so there was that.

Some first impressions of the cabin can be found in this video:

Our room was at the tail end of the car, which was also the last car on the train. When we walked out into the hallway, we could look at the rails behind us out the back window, which was both cool and a bit dizzying when the train was under full speed. Shortly after I stopped filming the video below, a train came whooshing by the other way on the other track and scared the daylights out of me. Wish I'd caught that, too.

Viewing Columbus out the back window

We passed through northern Illinois and into Wisconsin. When I lived in Milwaukee, I had taken the Hiawatha train from Milwaukee to Chicago many times, but I'd never been on the rails going west from Milwaukee, so that was a new experience. We went through Columbus, Wisconsin which was where my parents had lived when they were newlyweds, so she enjoyed seeing it from the rails. (My Dad was a huge train freak, so he would have really enjoyed this trip or even videos from it were he still alive. She recalls that he often went into Columbus just to watch the trains pass through.)

A couple hours after we departed Chicago, a dining car attendant came through to take dinner reservations. Like access to the Metropolitan Lounge, all meals were included in our fares, including a complimentary alcoholic beverage at dinner. I was very pleasantly surprised by the dining experience. I learned later that the entrees were frozen, but we both enjoyed our meals (I had the salmon, Mom the steak -- you can see the other options in the menu). They even had fresh flowers on the table and tablecloths, though the plates were plastic. We returned to our cabin more than full and with no real ability to work off that food in the next day, alas.

We stopped somewhere (can't recall) long enough to step off the train for a few minutes and to capture the sun setting. Nice end to the first day on the rails. Though a night in the top bunk was yet to come....