Best one-day/night trips

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saxman

saxman

Engineer
AU Supporting Member
Gathering Team Member
Joined
May 18, 2004
Messages
2,524
Location
Dallas, Texas
Next spring I'm going to be doing quite a bit of traveling with my internship with American Airlines. Most weekends I'll be able to hop a plane to travel the country. I'd like to take some day trips on Amtrak as well.

So what are some of the best day or one night trips to take? They must be from major cities in which I can fly out of. I was thinking like San Fran to Denver or Salt Lake, or LAX to Albuqueque. Also want some routes in the East. I will definatley do WAS to NYC to BOS on Acela, as I have never ridden Acela. How is the scenery on the Cresent, say NOL to ATL or ATL to WAS? What about the Cardinal or Silver Service?

Thanks for the help

Chris
 
Definitely put the City of New Orleans on your list, either NOL to MEM or NOL to CHI (everything north of MEM is at night both ways, so unless you want that overnight MEM is fine). The Acelas here in the east are a great trip as well, especially if you can do the whole route.
 
Zephyr between Denver and Utah is the most scenic route on the system. The Adirondack is a close second, but one end of it is in Canda.
 
If you can get into SAV, you can take the Palmetto to CHS in the early morning and return the same evening to SAV.

ATL - NOL is a daylight trip and can be interesting, depending upon what you might want to see. A lot of the trip is backyards and swamps, but the rivers and terrain are interesting.

Also, try the Palmetto from WAS to SAV - with are early evening arrival into SAV, with time to spend the next day in the city or along the coast.

Sounds like you might have great opportunities to use your AA connecitons.
 
To me, the ATL-NOL day trip is most interesting nearing New Orleans due to the bayou and cajun country-type scenery. Best to do that nortbhound since southbound can catch you too dark, either if the train is late, or the time of year

WAS-ATL is sort of neat, esp. northbound, due to the rolling hills in Viriginia the next morning, and you pass most of the government buildings and mounuments before stopping in the station at WAS.
 
The Coast Starlight from Los Angeles to Emeryville/Oakland is one of the best trips. I would probably rank this ahead of the Adirondack because of the superliner equipment and the dining car. If the trip to Oakland is too long, you could ride to San Luis Obispo and back on the starlight or one of the local trains. Most of the best scenery is between LA and San Luis Obispo. However, Just north of San Luis Obispo is a great section of mountain railroading with a high trestle, a horse shoe curve, and some mountain sdie running with a tunnel.

Enjoy :D
 
Thanks for the tips so far. I've been on the Starlight once, but would like to do it again, NB this time. I want to see the Pacific in bright sunlight instead of at dusk. I also would like to see the Cascades as it was dark when I went through also, say from Sacramento to Portland. The Empire Builder is out becuase AA does not serve any cities between PDX/SEA and MSP which is a two day ride. But I've riden it before.

I haven't heard anything about the Chief. Anything worth while to see in NM or AZ or CO? What about Florida? Anything between Miami, Orlando or JAX? Does the Cardinal or Capital cover any interesting things? I've done the Lake Shore, Vermonter, and Adirondak already.

I also have to watch expenses. This is an unpaid internship, so I can't afford too many trips on the train. However I am Select Tier status, so I will probably use those benifits to ride the Acela First class. Sleepers are probably out of the question though.
 
On SW Chief, riding between LAX and ABQ contains pretty interesting scenery in the vicinity of AZ/NM border. Going EB will be dark approaching Tejon Pass and whole length of AZ until Williams Jct. Going WB will be getting dark just past Gallup. It'll be a rare chance to see Tejon Pass if the WB trip is about an hour late. Plus, the ride goes at 90 mph!

You can ride light rails & subway from LAUS to LAX. In ABQ, there's bus transportation center next door and will take you directly to the airport.
 
The Cardinal and the Capitol are intersting to ride. Both are better eastbound, in my opinion. The Capitol goes over Sand patch early in the morning between Connelsville and Cumberlnad. This is pretty good mountain railroading. The Cardinal goes through the New River Gorge in late morning. But there is godd scenery for most of the day between Charleston and Charlottseville, VA in either direction on the Cardinal.

Note that the cardinal does not have a full service diner. At times, the sleepers have also been removed. So plan carefully.
 
In regards to the 90 mph Chief, I read on another board that, effective today, the speed was downgraded from 90 mph to 79 mph. I can't verify that, but there has been lots of talk about the speed being downgraded.
 
rmadisonwi said:
In regards to the 90 mph Chief, I read on another board that, effective today, the speed was downgraded from 90 mph to 79 mph. I can't verify that, but there has been lots of talk about the speed being downgraded.
Click to expand...
That's interesting. That means it would redo the entire SW Chief timetable. I hope it is a rumor, not facts. Checking on arrival time on Amtrak's website would confirm it.

Has anybody else confirm the rumor?
 
If you can you can take the Downeaster from Boston to Portland for a few hours up in Maine, great during the winter months and even better during the spring and summer months. Also the NEC offers great places to spend the day. Anywhere from Washington to Boston is worth the stop even if the train station is a few miles or more away from the airport...
 
gswager said:
rmadisonwi said:
In regards to the 90 mph Chief, I read on another board that, effective today, the speed was downgraded from 90 mph to 79 mph.  I can't verify that, but there has been lots of talk about the speed being downgraded.
Click to expand...
That's interesting. That means it would redo the entire SW Chief timetable. I hope it is a rumor, not facts. Checking on arrival time on Amtrak's website would confirm it.

Has anybody else confirm the rumor?
Click to expand...
Aloha

Someone on the crew in September, said that portains were going to be down rated to 70 MPH on portions of the track because it was uncomfortable, I even comented that I thought the horses were susposed to be up front. What a ride, now when can I go again? :D :rolleyes:
 
I don't know how much it would really affect the schedule. How long is (was) the 90mph segment? I don't know for sure, but I think it's around 400 miles (give or take, maybe less). Even if the entire 400 miles were 90 mph running, downgrading it to 79 would cost around 25 minutes or so. With schedule padding built in, that may not even result in a noticeable delay. Considering the train has to slow down in various parts anyway (including, but not necessarily limited to station stops), the overall time lost might be something less than that.
 
saxman66 said:
What other places does Amtrak run at 90 mph?
Click to expand...
We run 90mph for a short time here in Michigan. Between aprox. Kalamazoo, Mi and Porter, In. Porter is not a station stop, but rather the area where Amtrak merges with NS on it's finial lap into Chicago.
 
A BNSF dispatcher in another forum has said the same thing. I don't think it will really affect the schedule that much, though. No more than 10-20 minutes.
 
So here is what I'm thinking of doing:

SWChief: LAX to Albuqurque

CZ: Reno to Omaha (it gets to Denver too late at night to catch a flight out

NEC: WAS to NYC, NYC to BOS and vice versa

Silver Service: JAX to Raleigh and/or WAS

CityofNO: NO to Memphis

Either the San Joquins or Pacific Surfliner. which is better?
 
saxman66 said:
So here is what I'm thinking of doing:
Either the San Joquins or Pacific Surfliner. which is better?
Click to expand...
Are you strictly to AA big planes or you can use AA commuter planes?

Pacific Surfliner has more interesting view because of ocean. If you can go to San Luis Obispo, you will see Vandenburg AFB with launch pads to launch top secret satellites into space. SLO airport is served by commuter planes.

Also CA is forecast to be really wet season, so you'll see green in early spring.

If you're a farmer, then San Joaquins is a way to go.
 
I will be able to take any AA or American Eagle or Connection flight. I've done the Coast Starlight from PDX to LAX already so I saw the Pacific. I just want to do it again. I just have to watch out for getting stuck in cities with limited flights. Is there a second SLO afternoon train coming? Any ideas of what time it will leave or arrive? Right now the only one leaves too early or gets there too late. I want to avoid paying for hotels as much as possible.

Chris
 
Leaving trains for just a moment, are your trips on AA non-rev, space available? Unlimited use? Any time? Anywhere?

Regardless, it sound like you have a pretty sweet deal! Good grief, I shutter to think what I'd do with a deal like that. I might crank-out a couple of hundred thousand miles a year just cruising around the country. I'd try to sample all AA's aircraft types and would list the registry of every aircraft I rode. And I would definately look for their retro-jets (I saw one at ORD last Wednesday). These use the old AA "Astrojet" livery from the 1960's. They are real head turners (at least they turn my head).

Link here for a photo of a modern 738 painted in the old Boeing 707 scheme:

http://www.airliners.net/open.file/580696/M/

Note added: Upon further investigation, AA now has only one aircraft painted in the Astrojet livery: B737-823, N951AA. Spotting that aircraft at ORD was really lucky.

Pardon the non-train talk, but I am overcome with envy!

Back to trains: how about fly into IAD or DCA. Take to the former "Federal" overnight to BOS, then fly back west. As an option, you could take a regular Regional to Philadelphia, spend some time there, and then hop #66 to Boston at midnight (12:30am). The timing of your arrival at Boston (8:15am) might even permit you to ride roundtrip over part or all of the Downeaster route to Maine before taking your flight back.
 
PRR 60

The purpose of my internship is to get real world experience as I will one day fly for an airline or company once I graduate. The best part is getting to travel on any domestic AA or AE flight except Vegas, Alaska and Hawaii. It is non-rev, space-available. The jumpseat is also available to us. We can fly anytime from Thursdays to Sundays, returning to DFW by Monday morning or work again. So i just have to watch what flights are going to be full, and not get stuck anywhere for too long.

Sorry you envy me :) It's gonna be pretty darn cool. I'm definatly going to fly on each of AA equipment.

So I would like to ride some of the train routes that I have not done yet, at least the scenic ones, and Acela.
 

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