San Diego -> Florida routes

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I believe the most direct, and likely the least expensive, is the Pacific Surfliner to LA, Southwest Chief to Chicago, Capitol Limited to WAS, and one of the Silvers (I choose Meteor) to Florida.
 
Me? Well, without going into Canada or Boston I can see 16 major possibilities. But which one I'd take depends on:

• Whether or not there's a fixed arrival date in San Diego (SAN)
• Whether or not there's a fixed arrival date in Florida
• How much money's available for train fares, hotels, food, etc.
• How the train fare buckets are "aligned" if cost is a consideration.

I'll see if I can come up with a sketch depicting those 16 possibilities.
 
Thanks penny and niemi, incredibly fast responses as usual from this forum.

Of course I can plan a route from CA to FL but am interested in other peoples preferences. Budget is always a factor, timing would be from leaving the gathering if we can get there on time in the first place, but leaving may be flexible by 3 or 4 days? That aside we'll have a London bound edit: plane to catch in early November-ish, that will be a fixed date alongside arriving at the gathering on time.

niemi, don't go to loads of trouble over this, but if you had a personal preference or two would like to hear about them.

Thanks again, look s like a big round of beers if we get to SD
 
I'd be inclined to go lowest Amtrak cost SAN-LAX LAX-NOL, NOL-WAS, WAS-Florida. Connections should be no problem at any of the stations. However, if the Sunset Limited is really late getting into NOL, getting up and 'making' it to the Crescent departing at 7:00AM could be a real problem. I'd opt for 2 nights in NOL and enjoy the city for a full day before leaving.
 
If I had plenty of time, and money was no object, I would take the Coast Starlight from LAX to Emeryville, spend a day or 2 in the Bay Area, then the California Zephyr to Chicago, spend a night or 2 in Chicago, then take the Lakeshore Limited to New York Penn. Then spend a night or 2 in NYC, then take one of the Silvers to Florida.
 
The least expensive Coach route with all Saver fares is Penny's suggestion in Post #2 as no overnight stay in either CHI or WAS is required - provided trains arrive on time.

My personal favorite would be SAN - LAX - NOL -WAS - MIA only because I've never taken any train to or from NOL. But the Saver fare total for this routing is US$49 more than going through CHI and an overnight stay in NOL is required.

Bear in mind that although Saver fares are posted for all LD routes, they may not be offered for travel on every date more than a fortnight into the future.
 
Without knowing what routes you've done before (since I'm a bit of a completionist in terms of routes), I'd consider doing Sunset Limited to New Orleans, Megabus or the Crescent to Atlanta, and then Red Coach down to Florida (it goes to Ocala, Gainesville, and Orlando.) I'm not a big fan of Greyhound personally and prefer some of the other bus lines, and both New Orleans and Atlanta are worthy layover cities for an overnight or two to explore. Since the Sunset Limited seems most likely to be cut if Amtrak LD service is cut in the future, I'd want to do that route ASAP, especially west of San Antonio. It's also relatively direct, and would avoid any issues if hurricanes hit the Carolinas in October (which is quite possible, and would impact an all-Amtrak route but not a Amtrak + bus route.)
 
A lot depends on what you might enjoy doing at stops along the way.

Here's one possibility:
Surfliner San Diego to LA
Sunset Ltd LA to NOL (with maybe a stop in Tucson along the way? with a rental car, it's a lovely area to explore for 1-3 days)
two nights and one full day in NOL
City of New Orleans NOL to Chicago
Cardinal or Cap Ltd Chicago to NY or DC (staying in either city for a night)
then one of the Silvers to Florida

Not the most direct route ... but you wouldn't necessarily expect that on this forum.
 
Without knowing what routes you've done before (since I'm a bit of a completionist in terms of routes), I'd consider doing Sunset Limited to New Orleans, Megabus or the Crescent to Atlanta, and then Red Coach down to Florida (it goes to Ocala, Gainesville, and Orlando.) I'm not a big fan of Greyhound personally and prefer some of the other bus lines, and both New Orleans and Atlanta are worthy layover cities for an overnight or two to explore. Since the Sunset Limited seems most likely to be cut if Amtrak LD service is cut in the future, I'd want to do that route ASAP, especially west of San Antonio. It's also relatively direct, and would avoid any issues if hurricanes hit the Carolinas in October (which is quite possible, and would impact an all-Amtrak route but not a Amtrak + bus route.)

Hey, hurricanes hit the gulf states too. [emoji57] Ask those who live in Houston.
 
If I had plenty of time, and money was no object, I would take the Coast Starlight from LAX to Emeryville, spend a day or 2 in the Bay Area, then the California Zephyr to Chicago, spend a night or 2 in Chicago, then take the Lakeshore Limited to New York Penn. Then spend a night or 2 in NYC, then take one of the Silvers to Florida.

I like this plan, but would recommend taking the Capitol Limited from Chicago to Washington, then going on to Florida. I think the Capitol has better scenery than the Lakeshore, and I prefer Washington as a place to visit.
 
I like this plan, but would recommend taking the Capitol Limited from Chicago to Washington, then going on to Florida. I think the Capitol has better scenery than the Lakeshore, and I prefer Washington as a place to visit.
I always take the Capitol Limited, but have never taken the Lakeshore all the way from Chicago to NYP, and I prefer New York as a place to visit. Thus my suggestion of Lakeshore over Capitol Limited. :)
 
What a response, thank you.

Have to write that the two that appeal most are from west point and jebr. Some will know we don't mind riding buses if that's the best option, and we do have this thing about trying not to go back on ourselves in any one trip. Up to Chicago and back down to Florida feels a bit like that, of course caused by current Amtrak routes. We were trying to find something we have missed in the past, we have never tried either of the above.

Previously we have travelled from LAX with the Sunset Limited to NOL and onwards to Florida with Greyhound, that wasn't one of our best Greyhound rides although the next year we took two more Greyhounds of more than 24 hours and really enjoyed them.

Have also suffered from hurricane disruption when Mathew approached northern Florida 2 or 3 years ago AmtrakBlue. We got lucky in one way and were offered help to get home from friends in Virginia, we were able to divert easily thanks to good friends.

The journey across to Florida is one of three options we are considering from San Diego to get to the east (almost certainly flying out of NYC), none involve flying across the US as we would miss so much.

Just to explain we have travelled around the US a few times, the Surfliner, Sunset and Zephyr are our favourites so far. This part of the journey will be governed by which friends we get to meet up with or as we learned just this evening, two of our friends will only be 200 kms away from our French home... while we are away travelling. We are waiting to hear from a few more people before setting off in a particular direction.

Hope the many suggestions above help others looking to make this journey, there's enough travel ideas here to keep most people happy for a while.

Merci!
 
Might mention ... MegaBus runs from Atlanta to Gainesville ... however, there is no train in G'ville - but Palatka is only about 45 minutes drive and both Silvers stop there.

With enough notice, I could probably drive you to Palatka so you wouldn't need an Uber
 
What a response, thank you.

Have to write that the two that appeal most are from west point and jebr. Some will know we don't mind riding buses if that's the best option, and we do have this thing about trying not to go back on ourselves in any one trip. Up to Chicago and back down to Florida feels a bit like that, of course caused by current Amtrak routes. We were trying to find something we have missed in the past, we have never tried either of the above.

Previously we have travelled from LAX with the Sunset Limited to NOL and onwards to Florida with Greyhound, that wasn't one of our best Greyhound rides although the next year we took two more Greyhounds of more than 24 hours and really enjoyed them.

Have also suffered from hurricane disruption when Mathew approached northern Florida 2 or 3 years ago AmtrakBlue. We got lucky in one way and were offered help to get home from friends in Virginia, we were able to divert easily thanks to good friends.

The journey across to Florida is one of three options we are considering from San Diego to get to the east (almost certainly flying out of NYC), none involve flying across the US as we would miss so much.

Just to explain we have travelled around the US a few times, the Surfliner, Sunset and Zephyr are our favourites so far. This part of the journey will be governed by which friends we get to meet up with or as we learned just this evening, two of our friends will only be 200 kms away from our French home... while we are away travelling. We are waiting to hear from a few more people before setting off in a particular direction.

Hope the many suggestions above help others looking to make this journey, there's enough travel ideas here to keep most people happy for a while.

Merci!
Happy New Year Jamie and Rosie!!
 
Might mention ... MegaBus runs from Atlanta to Gainesville ... however, there is no train in G'ville - but Palatka is only about 45 minutes drive and both Silvers stop there.

With enough notice, I could probably drive you to Palatka so you wouldn't need an Uber

That is a very very kind offer Qapla. We'll see how things pan out over the next week or so, but even if we don't get to meet you've made my and our day, what kindness to strangers. Thank you.
 
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