The Day Before: Why?
The posts that follow are a report on a trip across Canada from Halifax to Vancouver, beginning and ending in Fort Worth Texas. The trip began on August 13, 2019, and ended on September 4, 2019. The posts are an edited version of daily updates that I posted to Facebook and emailed to a group of friends. They were intended for an audience which included people who have never traveled by train.
Why Canada? First, because I’ve travelled the United States extensively on Amtrak for a number of years, and have been to just about all the places that Amtrak can take me, so I want to see some new places. Second, I’ve heard a lot about the level of service on Via Rail Canada’s trains, and want to see if what I’ve heard is true. Finally, there is Via Rail’s most famous train, the Canadian. I’ve heard wonderful things about this four-night train ride between Toronto and Vancouver. This train is so well-known that Canada even put a picture of it on their ten-dollar bill!
I tried to ride the Canadian last year. I was going to attend O Scale West, a meet for O scale model railroaders in Santa Clara, California, then continue up the coast to Vancouver and ride the Canadian to Toronto. But while I was in Santa Clara, I got word from Via Rail that my train had been cancelled. In this country, the law states that Amtrak trains are supposed to have precedence over host railroad freights, but Via Rail has no such protection, and the Canadian had been so late so many times that Via Rail had to cancel one eastbound and one westbound train. And mine was the eastbound that was cancelled.
So, for this year, I dreamed bigger. I planned a trip that would take me from Halifax, Nova Scotia all the way across the continent to Vancouver, British Columbia.
The posts that follow are a report on a trip across Canada from Halifax to Vancouver, beginning and ending in Fort Worth Texas. The trip began on August 13, 2019, and ended on September 4, 2019. The posts are an edited version of daily updates that I posted to Facebook and emailed to a group of friends. They were intended for an audience which included people who have never traveled by train.
Why Canada? First, because I’ve travelled the United States extensively on Amtrak for a number of years, and have been to just about all the places that Amtrak can take me, so I want to see some new places. Second, I’ve heard a lot about the level of service on Via Rail Canada’s trains, and want to see if what I’ve heard is true. Finally, there is Via Rail’s most famous train, the Canadian. I’ve heard wonderful things about this four-night train ride between Toronto and Vancouver. This train is so well-known that Canada even put a picture of it on their ten-dollar bill!
I tried to ride the Canadian last year. I was going to attend O Scale West, a meet for O scale model railroaders in Santa Clara, California, then continue up the coast to Vancouver and ride the Canadian to Toronto. But while I was in Santa Clara, I got word from Via Rail that my train had been cancelled. In this country, the law states that Amtrak trains are supposed to have precedence over host railroad freights, but Via Rail has no such protection, and the Canadian had been so late so many times that Via Rail had to cancel one eastbound and one westbound train. And mine was the eastbound that was cancelled.
So, for this year, I dreamed bigger. I planned a trip that would take me from Halifax, Nova Scotia all the way across the continent to Vancouver, British Columbia.