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A Thanksgiving Tale: Texas Eagle, Pere Marquette and Southwest Chief 11/23-29/1993

I started planning my next Amtrak trip, choosing to travel between Chicago and Joliet, out of Chicago to Grand Rapids and Quincy, then the City of New Orleans from Centralia to Chicago and the Empire Builder from Chicago to Havre, all routes being new mileage. I planned the trip in two segments, the first over Thanksgiving the second before Christmas.

It was a chilly November night as I boarded this on-time San Diegan at Santa Ana bound for Los Angeles. When I arrived there, I just stepped off that train onto the Sunset Limited's through cars for the Texas Eagle and waited for departure.

We left on schedule but suddenly stopped within seconds and I guessed that passenger almost missed the train. We took off again but instead of taking the freeway route, went through Alhambra. With my ticket taken, I went to the lounge car for my usual rounds of drinks before falling asleep in my coach seat outside of Indio.

11/24/93 Waking up an hour outside of Phoenix, the Sunset was running about an hour late and I surmised we must have met some freight trains between Indio and Welton since we were only five minutes leaving Indio. We arrived at Phoenix and I managed to get a morning newspaper and read the entire Arizona Republic while we were still at the station. I detrained to find the fuel truck just arriving and a bus arrived with passengers from Flagstaff and they were boarded. We departed Phoenix an hour and fifty-five minutes late and as we passed through the countryside of Saguaro Cacti, had no major delays but arrived at Tucson two hours and fifteen minutes late. However, since I had been enjoying the Arizona desert, I was nonplussed.

East of Tucson, the Sunset Route was full of freight trains as we passed them in both directions at a frequent rate. It was good to see how busy it was and dispatcher did an excellent job keeping all of them out of our way. The ride to El Paso was very enjoyable and due to our lateness, I enjoyed my dinner of pork chops under the station's floodlights. This was my first meal since Amtrak sent their chefs to culinary school and from the way it tasted, I would say that Amtrak made another good choice. Off into the West Texas night we went and before Alpine, a call went out over the publc address system for a doctor if one was on board since a sleeping car passenger was having a medical emergency. However, the call was repeated three times to no avail then upon our arrival in Alpine, the ailing passenger was taken by ambulance to hospital. I watched the stars in the West Texas sky before turning in for the night.

I awoke to an overcast morning in San Antonio as the Sunset Limited proceeded for points east and we began our trip two-and-a-half hours late. Now that we had split from the Sunset Limited and starting the journey to Chicago, the Eagle takes a different route out of town than when arriving, so we reversed west down the Southern Pacific main line to the junction with the former Missouri Pacific tracks (now Union Pacific), where we started forward and began our trek out of town. This route was nineteen miles longer and naturally new trackage. In a short while, we were at Craig Junction and back on the normal Texas Eagle routing. The advantage of riding this route northbound is that I was seeing countryside for the first time which I had passed through southbound at night. In addition, this was also my first time in Texas Hill Country.

In the haste to board everyone in San Antonio, all passengers were boarded through one door and were now arriving in my coach looking for seats. A gentleman named Bob, complete with an ice, box asked for my empty seat and after we talked for a few minutes, offered me a beer. We talked about our destinations, mine of Grand Rapids and his Cleburne, before discussing a variety of topics and he pointed out interesting points in the Texas landscape with the professionalism of a tour guide and being a native Texan, his information was educational and fascinating.

When we arrived at Temple after turning onto the rails of the Santa Fe, we were only thirty minutes late after traveling the 157 miles from San Antonio. The train was given two hours and twenty minutes in the schedule to travel that distance so there was plenty of padding as we were travelling at track speed. Departing Temple, I realized it was Thanksgiving and read that the Dallas Cowboys were playing the Miami Dolphins at 12:30 at Texas Stadium. The weather forecast was for cold temperatures and a chance of light snowm however after travelling up the Santa Fe to Cleburne, where Bob detrained into the snow, north of town snow was falling heavily, staying that way to Fort Worth.

I never thought I would take a picture of the Texas Eagle in the snow at Fort Worth; it looked more as if it were Montana. As we reversed out of the station, the snow was falling at a more rapid pace as we crossed the former Missouri Pacific main line and were all set to run forward to Dallas, but could not due to the switch being frozen and not being equipped with a switch heater. After about a ten minute delay, the operator of Tower 55 decided to route us in a way that had switch heaters which involved five different forward and reverse movements before we were on our way east. With all the snow the train was disturbing, there was really little of interest in the outside world at this time.

Arriving in Dallas, it was announced that the connecting train from Houston would not arrive until about 4:30 PM so we could explore Dallas Union Station. I saw a television with the Cowboys-Dolphins game playing and the announcers were using the word "blizzard" to describe the weather there and it did not look like fun football to me. I walked up the street and tried an automatic teller machine and had a most unusual response "Cannot function. Too cold" and out came my card, so I returned to the warmth of the train and about 4:45 PM, the Houston section finally arrived and the coach attendant told me what happened. It seemed there were no switch heaters and at every switch, the crew had to climb out and hit the switch points with a sledge hammer to free them and he thought they had to do that eighteen times in order to reach Dallas.

With the trains now combined as one, we now had a full lounge car, a former Santa Fe hi-level diner converted into a lounge car. With a light passenger load, the steward announced that there would only be one seating for dinner, with the choices being turkey or prime rib. I chose the latter for my Thanksgiving dinner, sharing the table with a gentleman named Scott who also chose the prime rib and and we both enjoyed our Thanksgiving meal.

11/26/1993 About 3:00 AM, I went downstairs just as we were arriving in Newport, Arkansas and as I came out, a little old lady boarded then the conductor gave the order to highball. As he closed the door, an urgent call to wait was heard so the conductor ordered the train to stop and a Hispanic man boarded the train. The conductor asked if he had a ticket and his question was met with silence and a blank stare. He then asked the man if he had any money and again, absolute silence. Suspecting he may only speak Spanish, I asked him in Spanish where was he going and he responded that he was going to Chicago but when I asked if he had a ticket, he said no, then I asked how much money he had. His rejoinder was twelve dollars and twenty six cents and proceeded to inform me he was from Guatemala, in this country illegally and was trying to get to Chicago to see his relatives. The conductor thanked me and told me he would put him off the train in Poplar Bluff. As I went back upstairs to go back to sleep, I wondered what would happen to our illegal passenger.

It was overcast when I awoke as we were passing along the Mississippi River where I saw the damage from this summer's floods and it amazed me how much damage Ol' Man River had caused. We passed through the industrial areas outside St. Louis and I was surprised that we were still only two hours late and that nothing else had happened during the night to delay us further. We went by the old train shed of St. Louis Union Station, now a hotel, shops and a small railroad museum then arrived at the Amshack, where it was announced that this would be a quick stop on account of our lateness. However, after adding two Superliner coaches for local traffic to Chicago, we departed three hours late then passed by Busch Stadium and veered to the left just before the Eads Bridge and paralleled the Mississippi River with the Gateway Arch towering overhead to the left.

As we passed through the tunnel to the north of the Arch, I saw the high water mark from the Mississippi River floods on the wall and I could not believe the level, considering how high we were at this point above the river below. As we approached the Merchants Bridge to take us to Illinois, a Norfolk Southern coal train was running beside us before it crossed over in front of us. Our train then crossed the bridge before coming to a red signal and stopping on the east approach to the bridge, providing a wonderful view of the St. Louis skyline to the south and a junk yard to the north. As we sat, the junk yard became far more interesting as I tried to see how many different cars I could spot. It was announced the reason that we were sitting here was because we were between railroads in no man's land and the next railroad was not ready to take us yet. So with the views, we sat for an hour and twenty-five minutes and by the time we reached Alton, Illinois, we were now four hours and fifty-three minutes late.

I decided to get some lunch but because of the delay, all I could get was the last hot dog and I sat in the lounge car watching the rural Illinois countryside outside the train. North of Springfield, we went into the siding to let a southbound Amtrak train pass. A few weeks ago, the Texas Eagle became a tri-weekly train south of St. Louis, running with an Amfleet consist on the same schedule on the days the Eagle does not run through from Texas. Amfleet cars can run push-pull at great rates of speed when they reverse, while Superliner cars are extremely limited in reverse mode when it comes to speed. Once that train had passed, we reversed out of the siding, too fast in my opinion, and once we reached the main line, the power went out as the train stopped. I knew what had happened and that we could lose head end power by either engine failure or cable separation, the latter being the case. I saw the crew outside, walking the train in searching of the problem, so we sat again in non-moveable limbo but the passengers were already used to it, so no one was upset.

On the move again, we were now five hours and fifty-nine minutes late and the conductor announced that Amtrak service personnel would board in Normal, Illinois to assist passengers with their connections in Chicago. I wondered if I would be taking a taxi from Joliet to Hammond-Whitning to make Train 370 or would I have to ride the bus to Grand Rapids? We continued our trek to Chicago in the dark and a Normal, the representatives boarded and called us into the dining car by train number starting with mine to Grand Rapids. I was informed to go to lounge D check in as you will be taken to Grand Rapids by limousine, which sounded really good to me. Within an hour, we arrived at Joliet and I was back in my coach seat riding the new mileage to Chicago, where we arrived six hours and twelve minutes late.

Upon arrival at Lounge D, the seven destined for the route of the Pere Marquette were gathered and led downstairs to a waiting twelve passenger Ford van and our group asked in unison "You call that a limousine?" I knew that limousines come in normal and stretch, are mostly black and really nice inside. Apparently Amtrak or its personnel did not know what a limousine was and should have used the word "van" to describe the transportation to Grand Rapids and I had never seen a limo with a side sliding door. I took the back seat and found this van had no heater so put on my heavy jacket and we drove out of Chicago, making two stops along the way, one at Benton Harbor, Michigan, where we dropped off two passengers and the other at Holland, where two more left. As we approached Grand Rapids, the girl in front of me asked me where I was staying and upon telling her, offered me a ride there after hearing I was going back to Chicago on the 7:30 AM train, giving me an extra twenty minutes to sleep. It made me think just how lucky I had been to meet nice, helpful people wherever I go and with her assistance, I was in my hotel bed by 12:30 AM with a 6:30 AM wake-up call for the morning train.

Following my usual traveling breakfast of juice, toast and bacon at the hotel, I took a taxi to the Amtrak station for the 177 mile trip over this route, new to me, to Chicago. The one advantage about the van ride last night was since the train was scheduled to arrive Grand Rapids at night, I did not miss anything and was looking forward to riding the Pere Marquette. I had no idea in what type of coaches I would be riding on this unreserved coach train, which meant it could be whatever Chicago decided. At 7:35 AM, a three-car Superliner train reversed into the station and blocked both streets on either side of the attractive wood panel depot. I was boarded in the first coach for Chicago passengers and we departed on time; the second car was a snack coach, which had a counter where the seats were on the lower level.

We passed through an industrial area followed by residential areas then out into the fields which led the train to Zeeland, one of only a handful of towns in the United States starting with "Z". It was interesting to me that this part of Michigan was undulating, but remembering my geography lessons dealing with glaciation and where it occurrred, this made sense. We then stopped at Holland and departed back into the forest, crossing streams, the Kalamazoo River and as the terrain flattened out, crossed Black River and entered Bangor, where twenty passengers boarded. Continuing our trek south, we crossed the Paw Paw River twice, passed the large electric plant on the right, then crossed the St. Joseph River on a drawbridge which gave me my first unobstructed view of Lake Michigan and the lighthouse that guards Benton Harbor. We then arrived at St. Joseph-Benton Harbor station then travelled under the bluff for a few minutes before passing factories and returning inland. I saw hills off to the right which looked geographically like sand dunes and I remember reading about Indiana Dunes State Park, so this must be the Michigan version of this feature. We then crossed Amtrak's Chicago-to-Detroit main line before stopping at New Buffalo then within ten minutes, we were back in Indiana and at Porter Tower, left the rails of CSX for the Conrail main line to Chicago. We passed the steel mills of Gary and more views of Lake Michigan before we stopped at Hammond-Whiting, crossed the Calumet River and saw the skyline of the great city of Chicago on a very clear day. We then passed Comiskey Park and within minutes, went by Amtrak's Chicago maintenance facility and arrived a Chicago Union Station, ending my first trip on the Pere Marquette five minutes early.

Knowing I have a long layover until 5:00 P.M., I decided to ride Metra's commuter service for the first time and since I had never ridden on any Chicago and North Western tracks, chose to go to their station and take the first available train to anywhere. I left Union Station and walked through the busy streets in the shadows of the tall buildings to where I found the Chicago and North Western Terminal, although it did not look like a train station from the outside, rather another office building with shops on the lower level. Once in the middle of the building, I rode the escalator to the second level, walked to the left past the train gates on the right to the ticket counter and the next train was going to depart for Harvard in twenty minutes. I picked up a schedule and it would get me back in plenty of time to catch the Southwest Chief so went to buy a ticket, expecting to pay $6.50 one way but the agent informed me that since it was a weekend, I could buy a weekend pass for only five dollars, good on any Metra train.

I boarded Metra Train 615, led by F40PH 172, built by Electro-Motive Division in 1983, which was a five car bi-level trainset and found a seat on the upper level so I could have a better view, then inserted my ticket in the clip of the support for the seat above the lower aisle. We started our journey and emerged into the bright sunlight on elevated tracks, crossed over the Milwaukee Road main line and curved to the west with an excellent of the city's skyline before we turned north at Clybourn. After a quick stop, we proceeded directly northwest towards Harvard and there were many row houses typical of the northwest side of Chicago. I had my timetable open so knew where each of the stops were then the conductor walked through and noted the wrong date had been stamped on my weekend pass and wished me a good ride. At Mayfair, we crossed the Milwaukee Roade main line at grade before stopping at Jefferson Park, Norwood Park and Edison Park with the route reminding me of a streetcar line with a stop every three minutes. This line had three tracks to maximize the traffic flow and so a train can pass others making stops during rush hour without tying up the busy mainline. As I travelled further away from Chicago, the land opened up to be more countrified and after Arlington Park, the were more spaced out and we lost the middle track at Barrington, then crossed the Fox River, went through Crystal Lake, the junction of the line to McHenry, passed through Woodstock and came to the end of the line at Harvard.

I detrained as the crew took the train down the line to switch ends before returning to Chicago and it was now in push mode, so when I reboarded, I sat on the opposite side. The time passed really quickly and I was back in Chicago in no time and I thanked Metra for a great experience on my first ride. The wind was blowing strong and cold as I exited the station and almost lost my hat as I crossed the street. I then noticed an entrance to Union Station diagonally opposite the Chicago and North Western station and went down to the north platform so I would be out of the wind, then walked the length of several Metra trains in Union Station and went into the south departure waiting room.

I was back in a coach seat after the chaos of boarding and it gave me an opportunity to reflect over the last few days. We departed on time and proceeded out into a stormy night. I had a New York strip steak for dinner then sat in the lounge car watching the Illinois countryside pass by in the dark and the rain pounding the windows before retiring to my coach seat for the night.

11/28/1993 Waking up as the train was entering Emporia, Kansas, I discovered we were three hours late so the good news was the Kansas scenery normally travelled through in the dark would be seen in broad daylight. One by one, the towns of the Great Plains came and went in the form of Newton, Hutchinson, Dodge City and Garden City. After six hours on this bright Sunday morning, we entered Colorado and I went downstairs to the bar for a couple of screwdrivers which I enjoyed until our next servicing stop of La Junta, where I stepped off for some fresh air and noticed the baggage car was missing from our train. I asked my car attendant about it and he related that a hot box detector in Missouri had gone off last night and the baggage car had to be set out. They had no place to do that so the dispatcher said that after the crew visually inspected it in the pouring rain, to proceed at 50 mph until we arrived at Kansas City where they would set out that car. That explained the three hour delay nicely.

At La Junta, another locomotive was added for the climb over Raton Pass and the rest of the journey to Los Angeles. We made fast miles, parting the semaphore signals at a rapid rate before arriving at Trinidad and started our ascent of Raton Pass, twisting and turning our way up the pass with all of the landmarks from the book I read just before starting this trip. I love Raton because with every turn of the train, I could see either the front or rear and sometimes both and every time I travel over the pass reminds me why the Santa Fe built their southern main line to divert traffic away from the grades of Raton. Just before the summit tunnel, we passed the marker of the New Mexico/Colorado state line then at the Raton stop, half the passengers in my coach departed as they were going to Taos.

I returned to my now half-full coach and stretched out, enjoying the speed of the Santa Fe main line as we sprinted down the tracks and hoped we would make up lost time on the way to Las Vegas, New Mexico. We passed the battlefield at Wagon Mound and within fifty minutes, entered the station built as part of the chain of Harvey Houses serving the Santa Fe. This hotel and restaurant, the Castenada, served passengers meals and gave them lodging in the days before dining cars and sleeping cars with everyone detraining, eating at the establishment then reboarding to continue their journeys. Before sleeping cars, passengers would spend the night there after a long day's journey before continuing their trip the next day and all of this made a trip far longer than today.

At Ojita, the first siding outside town, we met our eastbound counterpart running on time then off to the left a few miles further was Starvation Peak, which is where 35 Spanish settlers met their doom from the Indians. We descended through the Chappelle "S" curves and crossed the Pecos River, ascended Glorieta Pass and had a twilight journey through Apache Canyon with the late autumn leaves still in intense colours. We departed Lamy into the darkness of the night and I had a 5:30 PM dinner reservation, which allowed an after dinner-stroll on the platform during the servicing stop at Albuquerque. The Chief then sped west into the New Mexico night with the Indian guide providing much new information about the tribes and a more complete history since we could not see anything out of the window. After about two hours of high-speed running, we arrived at Gallup, where our guide detrained and within twenty minutes, the Southwest Chief was back in Arizona, running two-and-a-half hours late as I returned to my coach seat for the night.

11/29/1993 Waking up just as we departed Barstow, we were now running only two hours late as we sped through the high desert, passed through Victorville and climbed Cajon Pass. For a Monday morning, Cajon was very busy with trains and the dispatcher did an excellent job of weaving us in and out of traffic. We proceeded west down the Second District from San Bernardino through Pomona and Pasadena and arrived at Los Angeles Union Station at 10:00 AM

That gave me sufficient time to catch San Diegan Train 572 for Santa Ana and return to McFadden Intermediate for a half a day of work.

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