Southbound, Westbound.
This is a trip I took, in December 2008, on Amtrak trains. Pictures are at
http://picasaweb.google.com/kummini/SouthboundWestbound.
Chicago
Well, first, northbound. Trains were on time whereever I had to catch
them. Not so where I had to get off. My backpack, laptop,
camera, coffee, bagel and I ran through Lafayette downtown, so that we
don't miss the first leg of the trip, on Hoosier State to
Chicago. The train however lost its enthusiasm or the six freight companies
on whose tracks it had to run to get to the Chicago Union Station killed
it. Or it got angry at the conversation I had with my co-passenger about
politics and podcasts. Public Radio groupies. And it is snowing and very
windy in Chicago. People were waiting for yesterday's train to Seattle. The
snow. I wade my way through it to the Field Museum. The Aztec (I keep
spelling it Aztex, things that math typesetting can corrupt us with)
exhibition was very nice.
`The Blues Train'
From Chicago, to Memphis, to New Orleans, taking people on a blues tour,
the City of New Orleans. I hop on, and picked a good window seat, to
stare at the night outside. It leaves on time, but is late to get to
Memphis, so the window seat pays off. The train is somewhat full, people
travelling home for Christmas, or transients like me migrating south. It
does some complex weaving back and forth in Chicago yards to get to the
correct track. First disappointment, it does not have a observation car.
It has tables to sit around in about third of a car, but it is crowded.
Another third, and the rest are for the diner. I got off at Memphis, to
continue the next day. Or that was my plan. Not the taxi driver's. He
showed up late, but the trains always are on time when I am to catch them,
the lady at the station said, you coming to take the train, it is gone, the
next one is tomorrow. I know that. No one enjoys reading train time tables
more than I. So I take the bus, which went south, and through many small
towns in Mississippi. I know why the Goddess of Travel sent the taxi late;
there is no observation car in the train. The blues train.
Memphis
`No drugs, no prostitution, no weapons no parking in front of the main
office', read the notice on a motel (I sure didn't stay there, with all
those restrictions) on the way to Graceland. I didn't go to Graceland
either. I just walked around, took pictures of all the messages people
wrote on the walls, and caught the next bus back. It is the afternoon
before Christmas, so most places are closed, including the civil rights
museum at Loretta Hotel where Martin Luther King Jr was assassinated. But
we can walk around on the outside. I wander around aimlessly, to the
Mississippi first, which was on the other side of an island, so I am
disappointed about not being able to say hello. I have an obsession with
the Mississippi. I don't know what it is. I think it is all the ports and
the barges going upstream and downstream. I go to the Cotton museum, which
describes the story of cotton around there. It is not a pretty story, but
the museum says it matteroffactly. The curator said a lot of people from
different countries come by, before me were two frenchmen. In fact, not
very many other people. I wander through Beale Street, a man hustles a
dollar out of me by reciting a speech of MLK Jr for about three minutes.
I head back to my room, wake up early next morning to wait for the late
taxi.
`The Big Easy'
Nothing much happened there. Jazz at The Spotted Cat every night.
Food at various places. The buses that I wanted to take never kept time, so
I couldn't go to Lake Pontchartrain, I can't say what is there. The
streetcar took me around town, but I don't know if they run on time either.
French quarter, tourists, Burbn street. Risque, said this woman who was
staying at the hostel. She said that Texas always says that it can secede
in I think she said twentyfour seconds. She said they wont. Why twentyfour,
I didn't ask. Lived in Galveston before the hurricane, now it is all in
ruins, she said. Indiana is a very strange place for me to be living she
said. Went to some town there many years ago she said. Don't remember the
name. No rye bread there, only white bread she said. Goodbye, I hope you
enjoy your visit here she said. Thank you I said. Bookstores in the French
quarter with stocks of books about the South. I looked for Faulkner's New
Orleans writings. New copies, expensive, or first edition, more expensive,
so I bought random other books. A bookstore, looking respectable, with
stacks of books that might fall over you, and have to be moved in order to
access other stacks behind them, does not have any book of Vargas Llosa. By
chance I ask the owner, do you stack them under L? Oh, people keep looking
for Garcia Marquez under M, so I just decided to stack them there and
Vargas Llosa under L. Fifteen minutes on the take-out queue for beignets at
Cafe Dumond or half an hour to dine in; so I took out. The next time I went
there, it was still too early, so there is no line at take-out, so I got
beignets and went to the river to watch boats go by. And barges getting
loaded and tugged. And the ferry crossing to Algiers. While waiting for the
ferry, I asked the man next to me what was there to see. Like a tourist.
Offended him too, I think, he just shrugged his shoulders, he lives there,
I think.
The Sunset Limited
It leaves New Orleans on time. It has the observation car, so I can't
complain. Again some back and forth through the yards to get to Metairie
and the correct bridge to cross the Mississippi. It is so high over the
river that it has long ramps (a mile may be) on both sides. The train runs
through marshlands. At some odd hour we get to Houston. It has a small
station, where the huge waiting benches look as they were borrowed from
some grand station. And posters of old glories of trains that came there
from other glorious stations. At some other odd hour, I got off at San
Antonio; my westbound journey ends here. I went to Mission Concepcion, one
of the Spanish missions to bring christianity to the native Americans. I
walk along the river at night, mostly looking for vegetarian food, a
steward is sympathetic. I liked the city buses here; they seem to run on
time.
The Texas Eagle
This is the start of a long return journey. From San Antonio, to Austin, to
Fort Worth and Dallas and various other places between them. Enormous
ranches spread on both sides of the tracks. The train has the observation
car. At Temple, we had a smoke stop and the coach attendent said that there
is the old depot of the Santa Fe company and I asked him if we are changing
to BNSF tracks there and he said that he did not know and he is no buff and
he only worked on Amtrak and I smiled. We changed to BNSF from Union
Pacific there. I think Burlington Northern Santa Fe is a better name than
Union Pacific. I also like that fact that it used to be Atchison Topeka
Santa Fe. Somewhere before Fort Worth, we were back on Union Pacific. At
Dallas, the conductor pointed out the school book despository or that is
what I thought where JFK was shot. Late in to the night, the observation
car gets crowded with people celebrating New Years Eve. '09 will be a good
year, a promise of a lot of travel. At some hour in the early morning, we
are stopped for who knows how long. Fire ahead it seems. When we start
again, there is the largest congregation of fire trucks very close to a
level-crossing. Or grade crossing, if you prefer. The train pulls into St.
Louis very late. They never kept time where I had to get off. I bought a
day pass on the St. Louis transit, to visit the Arch, to see East St.
Louis, to go to Forest Park and the Union Station. Which is turned into
some tourist attraction, and hotels, and parking lots. And a small
exhibition on the original Union Station. Happy New Year in St. Louis.
Missouri
From St. Louis to Kansas City, again westbound. The train is half empty ---
it gives the traveller a good seat by the window, and room enough to
sprawl. The cafe car attendent throws away a paper cup when I asked for a
cup of coffee in my traveller's mug, says that is how Amtrak keeps track of
the coffee sold in the cafe. He also has to remember the alcohol laws of
every state, the law of the land applies to the trains running on them.
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Last updated:
Wed Jul 8 23:39:08 EDT 2009