Amtrak Nightmare Part I

AMTRAK Nightmare! Part I

Ever think of taking the train for a leisurely trip to a distant location?

Think again! And Don’t Do It!

This year, best friend Jason (who grows more muscular and hot every day as he spends his time exercising away at the gym) and I decided to take the train to Florida. We had first entertained the idea because we thought we’d take Jason’s car to FL and save the cost of renting a car while there.

Nope. That wouldn’t work. It cost nearly a thousand dollars – depending on when you go – it could be more it could be less. Amtrak is worse than the airlines when it comes to screwing around with fares, raising them arbitrarily, lowering them when you’re not looking.

Even worse: if you live in Philly or anywhere north of Virginia, you have to drive your car down to Virginia to board it and yourself onto the Auto Train. That’s several hours right there. And then, it won’t leave you at your desired location. No, it leaves you somewhere north of Orlando. So, should you want to go anywhere else, you take your car and (after an tiring train trip) drive to that location.

But I went into “take the train” mode and, since flying isn’t one of my favorite things, I thought why not? Priced it out and made reservations. Jason misheard me when I said that it would take 24 (actually more) hours to get there. He thought I meant overnight and thought that wouldn’t be so bad.

I was looking forward to the trip but not relishing the long train ride. I’d taken a similar route before. Once, when researching material for a novel, I was invited to a WWII infantry reunion. In the South. I went by train and remembered somewhat more comfortable seats than they have in reality. But on that trip the other passengers included some little children whose parents were not familiar with the concepts of discipline, sleep-time, courtesy, concern for others, awareness that they are not the only people in the train, or awareness that not everyone likes screaming, dirty kids running up and down the aisles throughout the night.

Well, when vacation time arrived, we boarded the train in Philadelphia. I should have known right then that things were not right.

First: they could not get the down escalator to work. So all of us had to lug our bags down a very long staircase.

Then: the train eventually arrived in the station and there was little indication about where to board. When an attendant did emerge from the car, he looked as if he’d been subjected to a barrage of static electricity for hours before being allowed out. He was disoriented, gruff, and mush-mouthed.

Passengers crowded around him looking at him with hope for direction. He stared back, zombie-eyed, and looked at us as if we were supposed to tell him something. So people started boarding, ignoring him. When I got near enough I asked which car we should take and he pointed to one and said “Seat 12 and 13.” I lugged my bags (three heavy ones) into the car, made my way to seats 12 and 13 and lo and behold, they were taken. No surprise really. The attendant was an idiot.

So I lugged my stuff back and said that the seats were taken. He shrugged and pointed to the other car, saying nothing more. I figured zombies don’t talk much anyway.

We took our bags and found two unoccupied seats. After piling things where we could, we sat down and tried to get settled for the 25 hour trip.

It was then I noticed that the seats were nowhere near as comfortable as I remembered them to be. The space was small and cramped. There was a baseboard that was supposed to lift out and up to give your legs and feet a place to rest. Most of them were broken. And mine was one of the broken ones. But that wasn’t the worst thing about the trip out.

No, there was worse coming on that train. Amtrak Hell was just beginning.

Once we were seated and the train got underway, the guy across the aisle started talking. Not low and he didn’t have a nice voice. I glanced over at him and noticed that he was kind of like an uncooked ham hock. Large, pasty faced, with short cropped hair that was of a nondescript color. But his voice, now that was distinctive. Something between falsetto and baritone, with a Southern twang, and a whiney, grating, unappealing quality. And he rattled on to the woman next to him. I glanced over and noticed that she was an elderly black woman who was half interested in what he was saying, a quarter being polite, and a quarter in need of entertainment for the long train trip.

He was only too glad to provide thrilling tales of his work as a grocery store clerk. He threw in his marital life for kicks, his home renovation adventures, and odds and ends when tales of too many carrots, or too much cabbage weren’t enough.

Problem is that he enjoyed talking at the top of his lungs and never, I mean never, came up for a breath of air.

For FIVE hours straight, he talked and talked. The woman next to him would occasionally laugh or ask a brief question (which he talked over). And he’d barrel on.

I went for some food and tried to find the attendant so we could chage our seats (they were apparently nutsy about people changing seats). He was nowhere to be found. A second attendant laughed about the problem and said I should find the attendant assigned to that car. Which didn’t happen because he apparently perfectred the art of being invisible.

I returned to my seat and, after casting many a scowl toward the loudmouth green grocer, tried my best to ignore him. Jason gave me earplugs. Even they didn’t keep out the guy’s buzzsaw of a voice.

We tried getting something to eat. Since Jason didn’t want to go to the dining car we each went to the snack bar for something. Jason came back with some kind of sandwich which he found satisfactlry and gave me hope that maybe the snack bar would be cheaper, quicker, and just as good.

I went to the café car and looked over the menu. There was little that a normal human would want but I managed to find a bratwurst sandwich listed. I ordered that and waited while the guy popped it into the microwave and heated it up. Things didn’t look good and I wondered why I didn’t just go to the dining car – I didn’t want to sit at a table with strangers, that was one reason. The other reasons are more complicated.

When I and the bratwurst got back to my seat, I squeezed myself into the oddly shaped space (the space was cramped because the leg rest was stuck in a half-way position, one of my bags had to be wedged under my seat(since all the overhead racks were taken) causing less space to stretch my legs, and various other little inconveniences.

Once seated I tore open the wrapping and bit hungrily into the sandwich. To my surprise, I came up with a mouthful of rubber! The microwave had rubberized the sandwich bun making it damp, far too chewy, and inedible. The bratwurst was marginally better but I figured I needed some protein and ate it without the bread. Didn’t need the carbs but wouldn’t have minded not paying for them.

I choked that sausage down with bottled water for a chaser and went back to trying to read a novel while the Grocer rambled on. Occasionally I’d hear him say, “Are you still with me? You awake? I’m putting you to sleep, ain’t? Just tell me when you want me to shut up.”

Well, no person in their right mind is going to tell someone to shut up who just told them to do just that. Because they never mean it and to tell them to shut up would mean disaster. So, the poor woman just mumbled something which allowed Grocer Man to keep talking (not that he ever really shut up to hear what she had to say).

I’d have battered him with the bratwurst well before he got the chance to as me anything.

Jason was trying to stay busy with books and other things. His earplugs kept him buffered from most of the Grocer’s monologue.

The lights of whatever burg we were passing through created a yellow-red blur in the window and I wished that there was an eject button on the Grocer’s seat. The darkness and gloom were thickening and my mood grew ever more dark. It was getting late and I should have been tired. Just the tension of travel sometimes lets me sleep while on a trip. But the Grocer’s voice was so annoying it kept sleep at bay.

Then, he announced to the woman, dazed in the seat next to him, that he was going to the café car before it closed to get something to eat.

Next: The Nightmare Continues Down the Track