Took the southbound CS last Thurs. and generally was a good trip. Both the sca ( Robin ) and the dining car waitress ( Dorthey ) were great. Also , Winston M, an Amtrak supervisor , was very friendly and helpful. Although the train was painfully slow, we enjoyed the trip. At breakfast, I ordered french toast and was told they were out of french toast but did have pancakes left. How can you be out of french toast? Are you out of bread or eggs? That is like in the movie, Fletch, where Chevy Chase says to the reporter lady that he would offer her eggs benedict but he is out of benedict. I just found that hard to believe. The pancakes were very weak but lunch and dinner were fine. Enjoyed the large chairs in the parlor car. Arrived fifteen minutes early in LA and had no problems walking to the Metro Plaza Hotel, which was a very nice hotel as some of you promised on an earlier post. However, on the way from the hotel to the Amtrak station the next morning at 7:30 AM, I was walking ahead of my wife and another couple who were with us and a man who had been across the street a moment eariler , came across the street and approached my wife very rapidly( she was lagging behind us a bit). I turned to my wife and faced him and told her to let the man go by. At that point he stopped, looked at me and turned around and went back the other way. I am quite confident we had just avoided a purse snatching. The train trip from LAX to SAN didn't go so well. Twenty minutes from LAX the engine died. After 45 minutes, they brought a engine out to tow us back to LAX. By that time we had missd the next train and ended up getting to San 2.5 hours late. Over all we had a nice relaxing time on my first train trip in the lower 48 since about 1960. Thanks for all of you who gave me info on this blog which helped make for a great trip.
John
John
