Having been home just a couple weeks from my last Amtrak Trip in August, I knew I just had to get another trip in and do it soon! Reading all of the rumors about the possible demise of Amtrak's Pennsylvanian, I knew I had to get in a trip that would allow me to ride that train, be able to go to Cedar Point, as well as visit Cleveland, and also be able to head back to Albany and vicinity to visit some railroad buddies. Hence, Trip #21 for me on Amtrak.
In planning this trip, I used a variety of specials being offered by Amtrak including a 20% off promotion on their web site as well as Rail Sale seats. Due to Security Features on the web site, if you book a reservation which has you starting your trip from an Unstaffed Station, you have no choice but to let Amtrak mail you the tickets. I live near 2 staffed stations and wanted to pick up my tickets from a ticket agent rather than having them mailed. Because of this, booking the tickets was a very daunting task. 2 of the tickets, I had to book over the phone as they had me departing from Sandusky, OH which isn't staffed. The rest, I was able to book online using Amtrak's 20% off special as well as some Rail Sale tickets because each leg of the trip, booked online, started at a Staffed Station. I ended up with 7 separate reservation numbers because of this, but if you do your homework, you can stand to save a ton of money! I actually had to book 2 reservations to ride the same train due to the situation I just mentioned but it was worth it. This trip would have me riding a total of 6 trains over a 6 day period and would have me traveling a total of 1200 miles round trip. The Total Cost for the tickets was $124.00, putting aside the aggravation of having to make each leg of the trip a separate reservation, this was a great deal, and if you really want to find the best possible fares on Amtrak, then booking online and doing your homework is definitely the way to go. One good thing I could definitely say, Amtrak's reservation specialists were very professional, understood my situation and did an excellent job of helping me figure out the best way to order all of these tickets! If you ever run into a problem in booking reservations, call Julie (Amtrak's Voice Automated Reservation System) at 1-800-USA-RAIL and say "Agent", you'll be transferred to a reservation specialist who will be glad to help you. Overall, this trip was excellent. It was rather cold for most of it, but I didn't let that bother me. |
