chuljin
Lead Service Attendant
Pictures from this part are here.
Since my stay in LaPorte did not involve trains, and I was more a visiting relative hanging out than a tourist, I won't go into many details about it, but some highlights:
On Monday, my aunt had to go to South Bend (some 25 miles east of LaPorte) for an appointment, so naturally I tagged along, as it is a city I love (at [then] about 250,000 people, when I was growing up it was the closest/most-frequently-visited example of the 'big' city...interesting how my perspective has changed now living in a city that has dozens of suburbs nearly that populous). On the way, I treated them to lunch. The official reason, sanitized for AU, was that it was to celebrate the_traveler's birthday that day, but I admit in reality it was to celebrate my aunt's birthday that day.
I took several pictures of its downtown, including a few of the First Source Center, designed by one of my two equally-favorite architects you've never heard of, Helmut Jahn. He is perhaps more famous for such creations as the United terminal at O'Hare, the new Bangkok Airport, and the James Thompson Center in Chicago (see his Wikipedia article).
On Tuesday, it was now my uncle who had an appointment, in Michigan City, and afterwards we went to Lighthouse Place, an outdoor outlet mall on what had been the site of a Pullman factory. I was disappointed that the last remaining original building, which had previously been lightly and tastefully redone into a Levi's outlet, had now been torn down. Later that afternoon, back in LaPorte, I went and took several pictures of the old depot there, which these days sees no passenger service (someone may know if it ever had Amtrak service, or if the end of that predates Amtrak), but is at least passed by the LSL, and now houses the local chamber of commerce.
On Wednesday, I could have just taken the South Shore back to Chicago, but that would have been more easy than fun, and I wanted to try at least one of the corridor services out of CHI, so I instead took Wolverine 352 from MCI to NLS, and 353 back to CHI. As the train approached MCI, I bade farewell to aunt and uncle, and saw an Amfleet marked 'Business Class' go by. Naturally I started walking towards it. A conductor, appearing at the only open door, behind me, called out 'Why are you going up there, Sir? Wanna drive the train?' I wonder what would have happened if I'd said 'yes'. I didn't move fast enough to record the whole consist, but the last four of the seven cars were: 54518, 54555, 58002 (me...a Horizon Club-Dinette of the same kind I've grown to love on the Surfliner's 'Vomit Comet'), 127. When I first hatched this plan, there was 45 min at Niles, but schedule changes reduced that to about 15. As mentioned in my (revised) October 'Member Amtrak Trips' entry, I'd been worried about missing the turn, and prepared several contingency plans. Luckily, it was not necessary, as 352 was just about on time at MCI and NLS, and 353 was pretty late at NLS. So I had plenty of time to explore NLS' fairly attractive little station, and also take a few pictures of an Amtrak maintenance facility across the tracks.
353 arrived perhaps 25 minutes late, and I boarded. I knew already that AU's amtrakwolverine was also on this train, but I made no attempt to find him, as I had no idea what he looked like. The consist of this train was: 90225, 48187 (me), 54582, 54557, 54560, 54558, 35. Notice that on *this* train, business class and the cafe shared the *Amfleet* version of the club-dinette. One subtle difference between the Horizon and Amfleet versions 'punk'd' me...on the Horizon, there's a restroom at the very end of the business end, next to the vestibule. Well on the Amfleet, it was a phone booth without a phone. Lucky I didn't pull my pants down. I saved absent-mindedly pulling my pants down with only glass separating me from a curious world for the LSL (see part 3). I found the restroom at the other (cafe) end, but that wasn't working, so I went into the next coach. Anyone who knows chuljin will not need to be told that I had cheese and crackers in addition to the complimentary soda.
We didn't make up too much time on our way to CHI, and in fact lost a little more, since we had to wait for an open drawbridge at around 4:15pm. But soon enough, we arrived, and waiting for us at the end of the platform were Tom (MrFSS) and (IIRC) hessjm. Tom let me know my pre-ordered Giordano's pizza was waiting, so I went outside for a bit, then checked into the Met Lounge, where the AU group had laid claim to the corner furthest from the door, across from the soda/coffee/snacks. Among my strange hobbies is that I like to collect the single-route leaflet timetables, and at CHI I hit the jackpot, both within and without the lounge. As an added bonus, they were not quite done replacing the old ones, so for many routes I got the summer *and* fall issues. The pizza I was told was for me already had one of its six slices missing, which I didn't mind at all, as I was surprised at how much pizza I wound up with anyways, and I had only two slices before I was full. Even after everybody was full, there was still a significant amount left, so Eric (GG-1) had the good idea to save it for a contingent boarding at CLE. We consolidated it into two boxes, and everyone else thought it was a good idea, too, but noone else thought it was a good idea to have smelly pizza in their room, but I didn't mind, so I volunteered to hold onto it. In the end, it was not an issue...I didn't smell it, even faintly, during the approximately 12 hours it was in my room (and on the rare occasions when I laid down, my face was three feet from it). We had a grand old time chatting and catching up, and before we knew it, it was time to board the LSL (q.v. in Part 3).
Since my stay in LaPorte did not involve trains, and I was more a visiting relative hanging out than a tourist, I won't go into many details about it, but some highlights:
On Monday, my aunt had to go to South Bend (some 25 miles east of LaPorte) for an appointment, so naturally I tagged along, as it is a city I love (at [then] about 250,000 people, when I was growing up it was the closest/most-frequently-visited example of the 'big' city...interesting how my perspective has changed now living in a city that has dozens of suburbs nearly that populous). On the way, I treated them to lunch. The official reason, sanitized for AU, was that it was to celebrate the_traveler's birthday that day, but I admit in reality it was to celebrate my aunt's birthday that day.
I took several pictures of its downtown, including a few of the First Source Center, designed by one of my two equally-favorite architects you've never heard of, Helmut Jahn. He is perhaps more famous for such creations as the United terminal at O'Hare, the new Bangkok Airport, and the James Thompson Center in Chicago (see his Wikipedia article).On Tuesday, it was now my uncle who had an appointment, in Michigan City, and afterwards we went to Lighthouse Place, an outdoor outlet mall on what had been the site of a Pullman factory. I was disappointed that the last remaining original building, which had previously been lightly and tastefully redone into a Levi's outlet, had now been torn down. Later that afternoon, back in LaPorte, I went and took several pictures of the old depot there, which these days sees no passenger service (someone may know if it ever had Amtrak service, or if the end of that predates Amtrak), but is at least passed by the LSL, and now houses the local chamber of commerce.
On Wednesday, I could have just taken the South Shore back to Chicago, but that would have been more easy than fun, and I wanted to try at least one of the corridor services out of CHI, so I instead took Wolverine 352 from MCI to NLS, and 353 back to CHI. As the train approached MCI, I bade farewell to aunt and uncle, and saw an Amfleet marked 'Business Class' go by. Naturally I started walking towards it. A conductor, appearing at the only open door, behind me, called out 'Why are you going up there, Sir? Wanna drive the train?' I wonder what would have happened if I'd said 'yes'.
I didn't move fast enough to record the whole consist, but the last four of the seven cars were: 54518, 54555, 58002 (me...a Horizon Club-Dinette of the same kind I've grown to love on the Surfliner's 'Vomit Comet'), 127. When I first hatched this plan, there was 45 min at Niles, but schedule changes reduced that to about 15. As mentioned in my (revised) October 'Member Amtrak Trips' entry, I'd been worried about missing the turn, and prepared several contingency plans. Luckily, it was not necessary, as 352 was just about on time at MCI and NLS, and 353 was pretty late at NLS. So I had plenty of time to explore NLS' fairly attractive little station, and also take a few pictures of an Amtrak maintenance facility across the tracks.353 arrived perhaps 25 minutes late, and I boarded. I knew already that AU's amtrakwolverine was also on this train, but I made no attempt to find him, as I had no idea what he looked like. The consist of this train was: 90225, 48187 (me), 54582, 54557, 54560, 54558, 35. Notice that on *this* train, business class and the cafe shared the *Amfleet* version of the club-dinette. One subtle difference between the Horizon and Amfleet versions 'punk'd' me...on the Horizon, there's a restroom at the very end of the business end, next to the vestibule. Well on the Amfleet, it was a phone booth without a phone. Lucky I didn't pull my pants down. I saved absent-mindedly pulling my pants down with only glass separating me from a curious world for the LSL (see part 3).
I found the restroom at the other (cafe) end, but that wasn't working, so I went into the next coach. Anyone who knows chuljin will not need to be told that I had cheese and crackers in addition to the complimentary soda.We didn't make up too much time on our way to CHI, and in fact lost a little more, since we had to wait for an open drawbridge at around 4:15pm. But soon enough, we arrived, and waiting for us at the end of the platform were Tom (MrFSS) and (IIRC) hessjm. Tom let me know my pre-ordered Giordano's pizza was waiting, so I went outside for a bit, then checked into the Met Lounge, where the AU group had laid claim to the corner furthest from the door, across from the soda/coffee/snacks. Among my strange hobbies is that I like to collect the single-route leaflet timetables, and at CHI I hit the jackpot, both within and without the lounge. As an added bonus, they were not quite done replacing the old ones, so for many routes I got the summer *and* fall issues. The pizza I was told was for me already had one of its six slices missing, which I didn't mind at all, as I was surprised at how much pizza I wound up with anyways, and I had only two slices before I was full. Even after everybody was full, there was still a significant amount left, so Eric (GG-1) had the good idea to save it for a contingent boarding at CLE. We consolidated it into two boxes, and everyone else thought it was a good idea, too, but noone else thought it was a good idea to have smelly pizza in their room, but I didn't mind, so I volunteered to hold onto it. In the end, it was not an issue...I didn't smell it, even faintly, during the approximately 12 hours it was in my room (and on the rare occasions when I laid down, my face was three feet from it). We had a grand old time chatting and catching up, and before we knew it, it was time to board the LSL (q.v. in Part 3).
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