I woke up around 8:00am Mountain Time and headed to the dining car for breakfast. I would have the Railroad French Toast with sausage patties and a Diet Pepsi. The french toast was actually very good and not overcooked! After breakfast, we arrived in La Junta, CO, the next stop at 8:33am. This is a service stop/crew change point for the train and thus a smoking break was permitted. I took the time to go take a walk along the train and get some roster photos of it. It was sunny but extremely cold this morning in La Junta and thus my wearing a t-shirt and basketball shorts outside was probably not the best idea!!! I noticed that the last coach on the train that was supposed to be cut off the train in Kansas City was still on the train and would now run all the way to Los Angeles, EMPTY, using up fuel and generating no revenue for Amtrak. I need to address this issue at this time. This is a 4th coach that could have easily been placed into service and thus tickets sold for it which would bring in more revenue for Amtrak and help defray the added cost of diesel fuel required to drag this car all the way to Los Angeles. The onboard crew has no control over these things so my suggestion is simply put: if there is gonna be an extra car on the train, it should be opened up and space sold, simple as that, it's more revenue for Amtrak and helps justify the added fuel usage, OK, enough of my rant, back to the travelogue…
   At 8:47am,we left La Junta running only 17 minutes late. I changed into some slightly warmer clothes and set up shop in the Sightseer Lounge as the scenery was gonna get a lot more "hilly" as we enter into the Rocky Mountains. Our next stop in Trinidad, CO was short and we left there at 10:06am, about 16 minutes late. We ascended up Raton Pass going really slow, I took several pictures of the mountains and beautiful scenery along the way. At Raton, NM, our next stop, a smoking break was permitted. I stepped off the train for a few minutes, took a few pictures and got some air before reboarding. We left there at 11:09am, now only 13 minutes late. I had lunch at 12:45pm, and decided to have the special sandwich which consisted of chicken and Swiss cheese on some garlic butter toasted bread. It came with a small salad and I had a Diet Pepsi to drink with the same chocolate raspberry cheesecake I had last night, for dessert. All the food was very good. Our next stop was in Las Vegas, NM (It's Vegas, only quieter!), and we lost a bit more time having left at 12:53pm. Shortly after leaving Las Vegas, we had to pull onto the Canyoncito siding to let our Eastbound counterpart, Train #4 – The Southwest Chief, pass us. This mainline is not a primary line any longer (due to virtually no freight business left on it) and BNSF has subsequently left semaphore signals on this line instead of replacing them with signal lights. Amazing, an active mainline with working semaphores in 2008!!! We left our next stop in Lamy, NM at 2:43pm now 19 minutes late. I spent some more time in the cafe car taking more pictures of the passing scenery including lots of poplar trees at their peak for fall color! There was a small group of passengers, one with a guitar, who were leading a sing-along in the lounge car, it was decent entertainment and everyone seemed to be having lots of fun! We arrived a few minutes late into Albuquerque which was a service stop and crew change point for the train.
   At Albuquerque, there was time to get off the train to smoke or take a walk, or visit the vendors who had merchandise set up on the platform for sale. There was everything from blankets to jewelry to Sudoku puzzles available! One thing that wasn't there was the vendor who sold burritos out the back of his pickup truck, something I remember very well from my last trip through here in 2002!!! I was able to go photograph the train while parked at the station and get some air before reboarding and leaving Albuquerque on time at 4:45pm. The rest of the day, we would be on time or very close to it at subsequent stops. I headed back to the Sightseer Lounge to photograph the red rocks that we go past on the way to the next stop in Gallup, NM.
   At 6:30pm, I had my dinner reservation. Tonight, I would be seated with a couple from Michigan on their way to Flagstaff along with another passenger heading there as well. I had the Flat-iron steak again tonight along with Mashed Potatoes. It came with a vegetable medley but I'm not into beans and carrots. I also ordered the Buffalo Wings as an appetizer and had a Diet Pepsi to drink. The wings were hot, in terms of their temperature, but they were only "mild" to me in terms of level of "heat" and they were quite small in size but still not bad by Amtrak standards! The wings are one thing on the menu that even if you have sleeping accommodations, you still have to pay for them. No big deal, they cost $7.50. After dinner, I went back to my sleeper and continued writing this travelogue for a bit.
   We had stopped in Winslow, AZ by now and had to set our watches back 1 hour as Arizona doesn’t observe Daylight Savings Time. At Flagstaff, our next stop, a smoking break was granted. I had hoped to see another member of Trainorders.com there but he wasn't there so we reboarded and were out of Flagstaff close to on time. I then had a conversation with another passenger in the lounge while we made our stop in Williams Junction, AZ which is the connecting stop with the Grand Canyon Railway! I then grabbed the computer and went to the lounge car to continue writing the travelogue as my sleeper attendant had just set up my bed for sleeping. My plan is to take a shower and call it a day as I have a 5:00am wake-up call in the morning for breakfast, this should be interesting!!!! After taking a shower, I ended up going into the lounge car to write some more of this travelogue and chat with another passenger there. I eventually walked into the Dining Car and had a rather lengthy conversation with the Conductor and Assistant Conductor. After showing them my web site, the AC pointed out that he was in one of my photos from the California Zephyr last year! It turns out, he was AC on that train between Winnemucca and Reno, NV!!! So without even realizing it, I rode with this AC twice! After chatting until probably close to midnight, I called it a day.

   At 5:00am (8:00am on my brain clock!), I was given my wake-up call from the sleeping car attendant. I immediately headed to the Dining Car for breakfast. They had a very limited breakfast period with a limited menu as they had to shut the car down at 6:00am. We were running virtually on time most of the night so the crew had to have the car already closed up before arriving in LAX. I had the Railroad French Toast and Sausage patties again this morning with Orange Juice to drink. After finishing breakfast, I switched out of my "jammies" and started packing up my stuff. We made our station stop in Fullerton and were told that Los Angeles was 35 minutes away. I tried to put the bed back into the day riding position but couldn't figure out how to store the bed mattress so I said the heck with it! We arrived into Los Angeles Union Station at 7:26am, running an amazing 49 minutes EARLY!!! I dragged my luggage off the platform and headed inside. I needed to find out if what I heard at breakfast this morning about the possibility of a "bustitution" from Santa Barbara to San Luis Obispo was gonna happen but would find out from a ticket agent in LAX that this wasn't the case and that the train would be running it's normal route! And now, the pix you've been waiting for! Here's a ton of photos taken on the Southwest Chief, just click the link below!!!