Thanks Zephyr. I would have never thought about bringing food across the border. Being from Detroit, we often had dinner in Windsor, Ontario and brought our leftovers home. Never had any issues, but we won't tempt fate.
Maybe we'll have breakfast at the Pan Pacific, have them hold our luggage, wander around the area and then claim our luggage and take a taxi to the train station.Betcha you didn't declare the leftovers
I prefer it myself, but can deal with riding backwards. I have a good friend who gets motion sick riding backwards, though. Not everyone can just shrug it off.
I've been inspected for contraband food while driving across the border into Montana at backwater crossings. I suspect it gave the agents something to do. I had read the rules, so had no problem.Betcha you didn't declare the leftovers
I am a frequent border crosser myself, both on the Cascades and in my own car. The inspection process on the Cascades is much more similar to an airport inspection than crossing in a car and can be more intrusive/intense than the officer at the booth at a highway crossing generally is. If you are carrying a bag of take out, you will be told to toss it.
Personally, I don't push the food rules at all (which are the same for any mode). The details are quite complex should you want to get into them (avocados are apparently okay, oranges are not), but a simple rule of thumb is packaged products are okay except meat, not commercially packaged, no.
I am a NEXUS member, and NEXUS members are expected to know and abide by ALL the rules without being asked or prompted. That is the "trust" part of "trusted traveler". I am anxious to protect my NEXUS card, it is just too damned handy. There are few quicker ways to have a NEXUS membership revoked than to violate the food/ag rules.
When in doubt, declare.
IIRC, USAF transports have rear-facing seats for this reason.
I've been checking and it looks as though the additional cars mentioned above have been added, because coach space is available on some trains each day. Some trains are even going for fares less than the top bucket. Business Class still is squeezed.
This is likely to lead to a thread split, but...
1. Yep, same cars.
"Supply and Demand!"
Somebody bought the last roomette that last roomette remaining in the lower bucket's inventory, so it rolled up to the next higher bucket with open inventory. Possibly Amtrak's yield managers reallocated inventory among the buckets. The first is somewhat more likely, but the second is possible, especially since it appeared to happen to multiple dates simultaneously.
