Chicago and the Southwest Chief. Winter 1999 trip, Part 2.

Jan. 16, 1999 - The ride was uneventful, we stopped only once at Iowa 80 Truckstop outside Walcott for grub, and we rolled into Chi-town at five in the morning, a half hour earlier than expected.

At the Chicago Greyhound station I was put upon by cabbies licking their chops for an easy fare as well as a gent down on his luck in need of a couple of dollars. I exited the station with all my fins intact and made my way down the street.

The snow, which hit Des Moines the previous week, hit Chicago much, much harder. The sidewalks on the stretch of avenue I walked upon were still covered in snow, so I walked the half-mile in the street instead. Was damn glad we came in so early, I had no significant traffic to deal with on the whole stroll.

At Union Station I waited for the Amtrak ticket office to open up. I may have had my tickets purchased in advance but I still needed to pay up some more scratch to leave from Chicago instead of Fort Madison. After some hassle over fees I paid for the ticket addition plus the thirty bucks in fees that I thought would be waived. Not a good start. And it wasn't even dawn yet.

I got the lowdown on where to score breakfast and off I went. I was barely out of the station when I got hit up for some dough. I relented with a couple of bucks.

I ended up at a classy joint called Lou Mitchell's—a real old-fashioned big-city diner with good food and courteous service. I hit the coffee hard and heavy. Breakfast was a dream: nice puffy Greek omelet with fried potatoes, Greek toast, orange juice, prune and orange wedge, and orange marmalade. The meal set me back 12 bucks but boy that set the tone for the rest of the day.

Buoyed by my stated stomach I roamed Union Station for awhile checking out the architecture of the old waiting area and watching the Metra commuter trains ply in and out, wanting for the next train to be mine.

Tugboat plying down the canal at W. Adams bridge.
 

Mid-morning I mosey out of the station and cross the river, intent on checking out the view from the top of the Sears Tower. Getting up to the Skydeck isn't as simple as hopping on the elevator and away we go. First, we went through the exclusive entrance for the Skydeck, then hustled into an elevator that took us down to a sub-level floor where we waited in line to pay for admission. Then we were hustled into another room with examples of Chicago architecture on display while we waited for the countdown clock to the start of the next tour.

When the clock timed out a pair of doors opened up via unseen mechanisms, thus allowing entrance into a small theatre. Once shuttled in the doors closed behind, leaving us in semi-darkness. Then a small hatch opened up in the ceiling and Zyklon-B pellets rained down into a bucket from which gas erupted…

Not that is what really happened, but it sure felt that way. In actuality we arrived in the entrance hall, and are carried along the corridor on a conveyor belt in extreme comfort, past murals depicting Mediterranean scenes, towards the rotating knives. The last twenty feet of the corridor are heavily soundproofed.

That last part was scotch induced.

Once seated we were treated (or forced depending on how you look at it) to a propaganda film on Chicago architecture. After waking up with a puddle of drool pooled on my shirt another set of doors opened up and we ran though a maze of exhibits until finally we were in line to take the elevator up to the top.

The ride itself was the most exciting part of the whole deal. The feel of gravity tugging at you as you accelerate upwards with the elevators rocking back and forth and your ears popping now and then is an interesting experience indeed.

At the top all there is to do is to peer out. The sky above was bright and sunny but at our height there was a layer of fog, so seeing anything beyond the city was out of the question. It was interesting to note that the buildings below didn't seem that far beneath but in reality a vast expanse of ether lay between us. Feeling adventurous I decided to partake of an activity not usually associated with being atop a quarter-mile high building: I took a leisurely dump. The bathroom was quite immaculate and comfortable, betraying not the fact of our immense distance from the ground.

I snapped a few pics before I took the plunge on the elevator down to terra firma. I walked back to the station, watched a few trains go by, wrote a few postcards, walked to the post office to score some stamps, and strolled about the neighborhood.

By this time it was nearing noon and I was feeling the need for a beer and maybe some grub. I walk about trying to find a bar that was open to no avail. Union Station was situated in the middle of the financial district, and this being a Saturday there was no business going on. No business means no businessmen to serve hence the lack of open establishments. Eventually I found an open joint and savored a pint of Guinness whilst I bantered with the barkeep, a no-nonsense woman but friendly and easy to talk to.

I wasn't keen on drinking too much so I split that scene to go wander around the station again. I was feeling a bit peckish after the beer so I scored a red-hot and an orange cream soda. The red-hot wasn't much to crow about but the soda tasted smooth.

I still had plenty to kill; walked here, sat there, leaned here, paced there. Eventually the time came and us sheep were herded to the train. Being that I paid a small fortune for first class I was one of the first to stroll down the platform. I found my room in the sleeping car: a small space with two seats facing each other and some room on the interior side to stow my gear. The car attendant, an affable guy named Paul, greeted me and gave me the low down on what to expect. The conductor passed through shortly after, taking tickets. After awhile the train slowly started to move and so we were on our way.

Or so I thought. We moved a bit so we could accommodate freight cars being hitched to our consist. After maybe fifteen or so minutes of this activity we started up again and headed out of the city.

I've been through Chicago probably a dozen times or so, but I'll tell you I never left the city this quickly before. I read a bit and the next thing I know we were wheeling through the suburbs southwest of the city. We rolled through village centers on the commuter route and was quite impressed with the accessibility of the ever diminishing burgs. Now this is what mass transit should be about. Not that pussy foot piddly bus system back in Des Moines.

On we went as snow-covered farm fields replaced the scenes of village life and day gave way to the black of night. My dinner call came as we approached the Mississippi River crossing. I was seated with a young unattached couple heading out to Los Angeles. My dinner consisted of two wraps filled with various vegetables—mostly carrots and lima beans—and sides of black beans and rice. It was reasonably palatable; the wraps were a bit tough though.

We ate as the train stopped at Fort Madison to take on more passengers. On we went twisting around the bit of Iowa between the Des Moines and Mississippi rivers. The ride was quite bumpy which made for an interesting meal. But I was keen to split the scene and bolted before I found out that I could have had a dessert.

I was anxious to walk the train and see what there was. The train's passenger sections were comprised of two sleepers, a dining car, a sightseer car, three coach cars, and a sleeper car reserved for train staff. The sightseer car had a lounge with bar and food service on the lower level. One of the coach cars had a smoking lounge in its lower level. The smoking lounge could be easily described as a holding cell, depending on how you looked at it. It was pretty bare bones, plastic seats like the kind you find in really dumpy bus stations. There were quite a few dirtheads who spent the majority of the trip hunkered there working through their packs of cigarettes, pausing only to grab an overpriced Bud from the lounge and bring it back to savor with a Marlboro. They didn't even have the moxey to smoke straights. Filter tips suck.

I did run into an interesting character in the sightseer car, a middle-aged black gentlemen who could have passed for a distant relative of Lonnie Brooks with his sunglasses, vest and black cowboy hat. I chatted with him for a bit until the desire for sleep came.

I went back to my cabin and rested in the darkness, listening to the sounds of my fellow sleepmates milling about the hallway. Eventually Paul turned my bed down and palmed me a handful of chocolate mints. I reciprocated with a fiver.

And with the darkened Missouri countryside slipping by me at seventy miles per hour I drifted off to sleep, lulled by the rocking of the train.

Sometime before midnight the train stopped in Kansas City. I was sleeping peacefully until I realized we were not moving. That pattern would repeat itself for the remainder of the trip. I stayed up to watch K.C. slip by and so did consciousness.

Jan. 17 - Woke up before first call for breakfast so I walked the train and found my friend 'Lonnie' in the lounge car watching the blackness of Kansas roll by. We talked a bit and continued our conversation over breakfast.

It was a very memorable breakfast indeed. Sautéed mushroom and onion omelet, complemented with buttered grits, toast, coffee and juice. Dawn was creeping upon us from behind, and the dim light reflected a gently rolling countryside, not at all the stereotypical flat I’ve heard Kansas described as. We finished our breakfast as we rolled into Dodge City.

Onward we went as the morning progressed. We bid adieu to Kansas as we rolled into the southeastern corner of Colorado, travelling alongside a reservoir. Slowly the mountains rose up from the western horizon.

I don’t think I can describe to a non-traveled flatlander just how far away one can see the approaching mountains. It takes forever to come close enough to see the foothills from which the peaks rise up. The sense of open space is quite profound.

As the cities of Kansas passed before us so did the towns of Colorado. I say towns because there really wasn’t much to these distant places.

One town in particular, Lamar I believe, was like someone took the southeast bottoms of Des Moines and transplanted them here to this even more remote corner. At least Lamar has mountains on the horizon.

We were delayed for some time out in the boonies of the Colorado plains when a trackside detector indicated a problem.

At Trinidad I took first call for lunch so I could scarf it down and still have time to check out Raton Pass. This would be the first time I traversed the pass in daylight so I was looking forward to the scenery.

Lunch consisted of a well-prepared Gardenburger and potato salad. I wolfed down both and was proceeding to leave when the server asked if I would like a fruit plate to go. Well, sure, I wasn’t going to refuse that. I will tell you that the dining car staff were some of the best servers I’ve had in a while and I made damn sure to tip well. And they appreciated it so I got even better service down the road. Hey, do unto others.

The trip up Raton Pass was gorgeous. A lot of history has taken place here. People have been coming up and down the pass for millennia. The visible signs date back almost 400 years, notably the ruins of an old Spanish mission.

Interstate 25 runs alongside before veering off to crest the pass, whereas the rail line goes up to a tunnel that runs a half-mile through the mountain. The trip through was fun.

With the plains behind us on the other side of Raton we traveled on through the rocky terrain of northern New Mexico. We had another pass to climb, the Glorieta, and a narrow crevasse called Apache Canyon to crawl through. Apache Canyon is so narrow only one rail line goes through it. Pretty scenery nonetheless.

We made our way through the hills and mountains and desert prairies speckled with juniper and sage all the way to Albuquerque.

Albuquerque was the train’s pit stop halfway into the trip from Chicago to Los Angeles. Vendors set up shop in a parking lot near the tracks to push jewelry, fabrics and food. I made the effort to hit the burrito truck where I got a burrito with potato and cheese. ¡Muy bueno!

We got underway at dusk and night closed in once we were up to speed. We were behind about an hour-and-a-half so the train was traveling at top speed to regain some time. The vegetarian dinner course was those god-damned wraps again, even worse than the last time. The ride was especially bumpy making dinner even more difficult to consume.

And my dinner companions this evening were rather stuck-up types who had boarded on at Lamy and mostly complained about their various train experiences throughout the meal. The lateness of the train was an especially keen topic. Jeez I thought, if you all need to get where you’re going quickly then take a damn plane. Being a veteran of many transcontinental bus trips I was pleased as punch with the comforts of the train, but their dominant culture expectations were ruining my parade. I should have linked up with my breakfast partner, or at least I should have bought another burrito or two back in Albuquerque and stayed in my cabin.

I retired early in anticipation of getting up in the wee hours to catch the bus to Las Vegas. I woke up later in the night and noticed the train was going at a snail's pace. It seems we blew an engine somewhere after Flagstaff. Where normally the train is pulled by one locomotive and gets its electrical power from another, now it was getting both the push and the juice from just one engine.

We crawled into Kingman about as late as we were leaving Albuquerque. We held up there for some time while the train staff assessed the situation. Eventually we crept out from Kingman and slowly made our way to Needles.