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The train is not at all crowded. The seats tilt nicely back, and there
is a lot of room for feet - all in all train is the way to
travel. One can even sleep in these seats - not super comfortable but
possible. There is also a bar serving Sam Adams and showing a
couple of bad movies per night.
Next morning we have breakfast in the dining car that joined the train in Spokane, Washington during the night. Continental breakfast (i..e corn flakes ;) and a Southwestern quiche are served to table. There is not very much to report, since not very much happens in the train. We skip the lunch and have an early dinner in the dining car: Ravioli ($10) and Lamb ($17), both quite good. With half bottles of wine the dinner costs $47 for two. Next morning we wake up at 7am. in St. Paul, Minnesota. No food can be found at the station, so we have another breakfast in the dining car. We sleep whole morning till it is time for lunch, a salad and a garden burger. Then we sleep some more, have one beer in cafe and sleep again. Finally we are in Chicago. We have tickets form Chicago to Indy, but we cannot check in our bikes to that train. It is the Labor Day and downtown car rentals are closed already, or the ones that are open do not have cars to fit our bikes. We make a strategic error of checking our bikes out at the Amtrak station before detailing the plan. When we finally manage to reserve a car for the next day and a hostel for the night, we have to pay to get the bikes back to the storage at the station + lockers for our other stuff. After all that hassle, we finally get to the hostel, take a shower and rush to Hopleaf for dinner. Next morning we have breakfast at Orange, a really nice and trendy new place. We take the blue line to the O'Hare Airport, pick up the rental car and drive back to the Amtrak station. First we assemble the bikes in order to haul the stuff to the car, then disassemble them (just a little bit), pack them and finally, we are on our way home. |