The niggles first.
The sleeping cars both ways were reasonably comfortable, but they are
showing their age. They were from the original two-story Superliner
order of 1979-81, and were rebuilt some time in the 1990s. Now the
refurbishing has lost its shine. The interior looks OK for the most
part, but seams -- especially in the bathrooms -- are gaping and no
amount of caulking can bridge them.
What's more, the in-room electrical outlets in our roomettes in both
northbound and southbound sleepers were not working. Fortunately this
was not a writing trip laboring over a laptop, or I would have been
upset. I was able to recharge my iPod Touch in the "Cross Country Cafe"
dining car, which has outlets at every seat.
The closet door of the southbound roomette wouldn't latch shut. This is
why veteran Amtrak travelers bring along a roll of duct tape, the
world's greatest rattle-dampener.
During the night on the southbound trip, one of the two footlatches
that hold down the roomette seats to form a lower bunk slipped open,
causing one seat to slide partially back and giving me the sensation of
trying to sleep on the edge of a ski jump. This happened at 3 a.m. and
I decided not to awaken Debby in the berth above me by calling the
attendant for a fix. So I got up and read in an empty roomette until
breakfast at 6:30 a.m. (Later I learned that it would have taken the
attendant 20 seconds to push the bed back down and pull up on the
footlatch to secure it.)
These particular sleeping cars clearly are due for another rebuild, but
the refurbished dining and lounge cars were nearly spanking fresh -- no
complaints there.
I did venture into one of the three coaches behind the lounge car to
use a downstairs bathroom, and was horrified. All four bathrooms in the
tattered old coach were damp, filthy and bedecked with tendrils and
scraps of toilet paper. Either the riders had no manners or the
attendant was too lazy or overwhelmed to police the place.
Otherwise I found no fault with the service crews in both directions.
Our southbound sleeper attendant seemed to spend a lot of time chatting
with other crew in the dining car, but he was always present when we
wanted him. The northbound attendant was quite solicitous, checking
with us often to see if we needed anything. And the dining-car
waitstaffs on both runs were efficient and friendly.
New
Orleans Union Passenger Terminal. The bus boarding gates are at left,
the train gates to the
right. Although the terminal seems deserted, it handles some 550
passengers aboard three long-distance Amtrak trains every day.
Passengers
head for the Sunset Limited to
Los Angeles. Note the Amtrak cop with the German shepherd in the
center. The officer behind the conductor and her black Lab (legs barely
visible) gave the passengers close scrutiny. The dogs and their
handlers later would board the City
of New Orleans for Hammond, Louisiana.
Detail
of
Conrad Albrizio's powerful 120-foot-long mural (restored after
Hurricane Katrina in 2005) in the station depicting Louisiana and New
Orleans
history. It's easy to see where the city's sympathies lay during
the Civil War.
The cuisine? Acceptable American Road Food, nothing more -- and nothing
less. I did not try the special New Orleans dishes. At lunch on the
southbound, there was no salad to go with the gumbo, and at dinner on
the northbound I decided the New York strip steak was likely to be the
most reliable item on the menu. (Amtrak steak dinners are consistently
superior to the other dishes.)
One does not ride the City of New
Orleans for the scenery. Southbound
in January, first light does not come until after Memphis, and the
trackside views of Tennessee and Mississippi are unremarkable, unless
one has a soft spot for derelict industrial buildings and auto
graveyards.
"Don't
bother" -- what? Probably
"don't bother looking for something to steal -- there ain't anything
here but us old rails and scrap." This was the exciting trackside
scenery during a smoking stop at Yazoo City, Mississippi.
Only in the last hour (or first,
northbound) of the ride does the
scenery become interesting as the train speeds through Louisiana bayou
country and past Lake Pontchartrain. Hundreds and hundreds of egrets
and pelicans nest in cypress swamps along the tracks. Getting good
photos from the train is not easy, because the City of New Orleans pounds along
seemingly at better than 70 miles an hour on
the
straight
stretches. The scenery just zips by too fast.
Dead
cypresses in a bayou and passing
traffic on Interstate 10 block the view of Lake Pontchartrain
from the lounge car. This shot was taken half an hour out of
NOUPT on
the northbound City of New Orleans.
There was a brief item of interest
on the northbound train: three
security dogs (two German shepherds and a black Lab) handled by a
four-person team of Amtrak cops. They all watched the passengers
passing through the portal at New Orleans Union Terminal, the dogs'
noses close by. The two shepherds rode in the lounge car, their
handlers telling passersby gently but firmly not to pet them because
they were working. The Lab rode in the crew car behind the locomotive.
All three dogs debarked (excuse me) at the first stop, Hammond in
central Louisiana, and did their sniffy thing in the hold of the
baggage-coach behind the lounge car as we watched. It made sense. If
drug smugglers or terrorists manage to slip through the Port of New
Orleans, they might think loading their contraband or bombs at a
station down the line would fool the cops. I suspect the dog teams
inspect the trains at random, dividing their time among three runs that
begin in the Big Easy -- the City of New Orleans, the Sunset Limited to
Los Angeles and the Crescent to Washington and New York.
Or maybe it's all for show. When we asked a conductor in the lounge car
if the dogs were hunting drugs or explosives, he rolled his eyes,
waggled his eyebrows and said with a wry smile, "Sorry, I can't say."
The timekeeping? Both trains ran 20 to 30 minutes late most of the way,
but thanks to schedule padding arrived in New Orleans and Chicago on
time -- or close to it.
Inside
the Cafe du Monde on the
southern edge of the French Quarter. Every visitor to New Orleans must
sample its chicory coffee and beignets, even on a cold day in
January
when the outdoor tables and chairs are closed.
BEFORE
TAKING a train trip
anywhere, I consult the habitues of
the
TrainWeb
RailForum's Amtrak group, an invaluable repository of unofficial
experts
full of information about hotels and restaurants as well as trains.
This time I wanted to know where to eat in New Orleans that wasn't
either touristy or budget-busting, and the collective wisdom of the
forum came through again.
Go where the locals go, they said, not the pricey establishments of the
famous TV chefs, and they came up with a number of suggestions.
On our first evening in New Orleans, Debby and I dined at a highly
recommended Cajun bistro called Cafe Maspero at 601 Decatur Street,
cattycorner from the old Jax Brewery on the southeastern edge of the
French Quarter.
We weren't disappointed by either the prices (low) or the portions
(huge). Or by the house merlot, remarkably good for $4.50 a glass. I
passed up the much-praised muffaletta and jambalaya for a dish I've
always loved, redbeans and andouille sausage over rice with a side of
French bread. First-rate, and so large I couldn't clean the plate. (In
the interest of full disclosure: Debby said hers was OK, only OK.)
The next morning we did the touristy thing and, after a few minutes
photographing the sights at Jackson Square, broke our fast at Cafe du
Monde, the historic coffeehouse in the French Market on the waterfront.
As always, the beignets and cafe au lait were delicate and warming. The
weather being unusually cold for New Orleans, just above freezing, the
cafe's famous outdoor tables were closed, but there was room inside,
where French Quarter workers grabbed take-outs for the office.
After two hours of camera work in the Quarter, we stopped at another
highly recommended restaurant, the Camellia Grill on the corner of
Toulouse and Chartres. (There's another on St. Charles Street near
Tulane University, and branches in Baton Rouge and Destin, Florida.)
Now this is where you find the locals on a workday morning.
A
grillman at the Camellia Grill in
the French Quarter builds an enormous omelet. Debby and I shared
one, and
even half of it was way
too
big to finish. No wonder this
eatery is popular with the locals on their way to work.
This Camellia is an
unprepossessing place in classic American Diner
Style, with two large U-shaped counters flanked by fixed stools. On one
side lie two grills and half a dozen workers.
On the Trainweb forum I was warned that the Camellia Grill omelets were
hubcap-sized, way too big to finish. So Debby and I shared a
ham-and-cheeser that was cut and served on separate plates, with
separate piles of hash browns -- and still was way too big for either
of us to finish.
I considered the omelet excellent, and Debby thought hers
nonpareil. But the real attraction of the place turned out to be the
chattering camaraderie among countermen, grillmen and customers.
Amusing conversation ebbs and flows and surges all day, and the staff
seemed as friendly to the two lone tourists as they were to the locals,
telling stories of deep freezes of past years in the Big Easy.
And the prices are standard for diner fare -- inexpensive, but not dirt
cheap.
After haring with our cameras all over frozen New Orleans all day, we
returned to our hotel tired and cold, and both my back and knees were
bothering me from the unaccustomed activity. At dinnertime we looked at
each other and decided not to hobble out in the frigid wind again, but
to remain snug and warm at the Omni Royal Orleans and dine in its Rib
Room, no matter what it cost.
The Rib Room is definitely pricey -- two entrees, two glasses of wine
and a shared chocolate mousse set us back more than a C-note, with tip.
But this is New Orleans, and even the hotel dining rooms -- so often
disappointing elsewhere -- live up to the city's high standards. Debby
still swoons over her blackened salmon over stone-ground
grits, drizzled with tabasco butter sauce. I was not in the least bit
disappointed by my grilled black drum, fresh from the Gulf.
On this trip, life was finger-lickin' good, if you'll excuse the
expression.
A
Perley Thomas streetcar
turns around on Canal Street before heading back southwest on
St. Charles Street.
FOR
THE
TOURIST who is an
unreconstructed rail buff, the streetcars of
New Orleans are a powerful attraction, and of course I just had to ride
them during my recent two-day visit to the Big Easy.
Actually, we had time to patronize just one of the three lines -- the
oldest, the 7 1/2-mile-long St. Charles Avenue line, which has existed
since 1835. One morning I rode it for several miles west from Canal
Street along the Garden District all the way to Tulane University, and
was struck by the fact that native New Orleanians, not just tourists,
ride the line heavily. That should not be surprising, for each ride
costs just $1.25, and seniors and people with disabilities get a
discount. (In Chicago, the regular fare for a CTA ride s $2.25.)
The St. Charles line has an interesting history. Originally steam
locomotives pulled the cars, but when those who lived along the street
finally had their fill of smoke and cinders, horses and mules were
employed as motive power. That's backwards. Usually early streetcar
lines began with horses and later moved to steam.
In 1893 the line was electrified.
Rail buffs notice instantly that the distance between rails spans 5
feet 2 1/2 inches, not the conventional 4 feet 8 1/2 inches of American
railroading. Supposedly broad-gauge tracks give a better, stabler ride
with less rocking. One of the other two lines, the Riverfront
line, was originally built in 1988 to the 4 feet 8 1/2 inch standard,
but was regauged in 1997 to broad gauge so that its cars could run on
the other two lines to the storage barns.
The
streetcar motorman's view down
St. Charles
Street. Note the unusually broad gauge of the tracks.
The colorful red cars on the Canal
St. and Riverfront lines are fairly
new or recent rebuilds, but the classic green Perley Thomas streetcars
on the St. Charles run date back to 1923 and 1924.
When Hurricane Katrina wrecked the city in 2005, all the lines were
badly damaged and the red cars were ruined by floodwaters. The green
cars, however, had been stored on high ground and escaped damage. Not
until late 2008 were all three lines fully restored to service.
New Orleans clearly loves its streetcars. Debby and I noticed
that the motormen and motorwomen, like service people everywhere in the
city, are unfailingly kind to everyone, locals and tourists, and are
quick to give directions when asked. That, in our experience, rarely
happens in Chicago or New York.
That shouldn't be surprising. New Orleans still has not completely
recovered from Katrina, and its people know that the best way to
attract tourists again is to make them feel welcome and perhaps valued
for something more than their money.
They sure did me.
FEBRUARY 7: The New York Times'
transit blog reports that New
Orleans plans to expand its streetcar
lines in a big way.
The imposing monument to Robert
E.
Lee at Lee
Circle on the St. Charles line.
ONE
OF
NEW ORLEANS'
lesser-known treasures (to visitors from the
North, at any rate) is the little Civil War Museum at Confederate
Memorial Hall on 929 Camp Street in the Warehouse District a block
south of the St. Charles streetcar line at the Lee Circle stop hard by
the magnificent monument to Robert E. Lee.
The Civil War Museum sits in the shadow of the huge National World War
II Museum down the
block. Debby and I having just one full day in New Orleans on
this visit, we decided to skip the big place -- it reportedly takes a
full day to explore -- and try the smaller museum instead.
The
post-Katrina sign says
"Civil War Museum," but inside it's a melancholy memorial to
Confederate soldiers.
The sign outside proclaims it the
"Civil War Museum," but inside it's
really the
Confederate Museum it has been since 1891. The place was renamed after
Katrina shattered tourism to New Orleans in 2005, in the hope that
visitors from the North would be less apt to turn away from symbols of
the South's slave history. "You're not offended?" the lady at the door
asked when we inquired about the name change.
No, we weren't, for we're not unreconstructed rebels with disdain for
political correctness. Besides, the little brick building turned out to
be a somber, even melancholy repository of human memories, not a
vainglorious display of defiance. Whatever one might say about their
cause, these soldiers, the museum seems to say, fought and died for
what they believed in, and even if they lost the war, their courage
should not go unnoticed. There's nothing celebratory about this museum,
as there too often is in national shrines to victory.
Though it's the second largest Southern war museum in the country (the
biggest is the Museum of the Confederacy in Richmond), It's fairly
small as such institutions go, with one large room and a corridor full
of display cases of artifacts from 1861-1865. Some five thousand
objects are on display, with 95,000 others stored for research at
Tulane University.
Despite
the "No Photography" sign,
visitors are allowed to snap a long shot inside the Confederate Museum.
Among the items on view: The
personal belongings of Confederate
President Jefferson Davis; the uniforms, sword and saddle of Gen.
Braxton Bragg; the uniform of Gen. P.G.T. Beauregard; various swords,
cannons and arms, and personal relics such as musette bags and letters
home. There are bloodstained regimental battle flags, notably one
carried at First Manassas (Bull Run) in 1861. The letters and documents
humanize the people who wrote and carried them.
One particular item of interest is a tattered blue Confederate
infantryman's uniform worn at First Manassas. Because there was
confusion over who was whom in the heat of battle, the Confederates
mostly switched to gray-and-butternut uniforms for the rest of the war.
The museum takes only an hour to visit thoroughly, and you'll come away
with respect for the human beings -- fellow Americans -- who mostly by
accident of birthplace fought and died on the wrong side of history.
Your correspondent with a Brown
Bess
musket from 1805, spotted in the window
of an antique arms, swords, currency and coins shop in the French
Quarter.
ON
OUR
WAY back from the
museum
we happened upon an establishment that
stopped me as soon as I glanced into the window.
"Unless I miss my guess," I told Debby at the door of James H.
Cohen & Sons, an antique firearms, swords, currency and coins
establishment at 437 Royal Street, "that's a genuine
Brown Bess."
I was captivated because a Brown Bess -- the flintlock muzzle-loading
musket that was the standard British infantry long arm from 1722 to
1838 -- is an important furnishing in my fourth Steve Martinez mystery
novel. I'd seen replicas, but never the real thing.
So in the interest of research we entered the shop. Upon being told
that I was a novelist and had written about the weapon, the saleslady
took the Bess down from its honored place in a long rack of scores upon
scores of antique muzzle-loaders, and handed it to me while Debby
captured the event with her camera. It was like grasping a piece
of history.
The .75 caliber Bess was to both Redcoats and Continental soldiers in
the Revolutionary War what the tommy gun was to Al Capone and the M-1
to the GIs of World War II. Like those weapons, the Bess was more than
a tool; it was also a symbol -- in this case a symbol of empire.
This particular Brown Bess was dated 1805, and it did not take much of
a leap of imagination to think the weapon might have served on either
side at the Battle of New Orleans in 1815. It could also have been
carried by a Confederate soldier early in the Civil War.
The musket even has figured in literary history. Rudyard Kipling
dedicated a long poem, "Brown Bess," to it. Here are the first three
stanzas:
In the days of lace-ruffles,
perukes
and brocade
Brown Bess was a partner whom
none
could despise--
An out-spoken, flinty-lipped,
brazen-faced jade,
With a habit of looking men
straight
in the eyes--
At Blenheim and Ramillies fops
would
confess
They were pierced to the heart
by
the
charms of Brown Bess.
Though her sight was not long
and
her
weight was not small,
Yet her actions were winning,
her
language was clear;
And everyone bowed as she
opened
the
ball
On the arm of some
high-gaitered,
grim grenadier.
Half Europe admitted the
striking
success
Of the dances and routs that
were
given by Brown Bess.
When ruffles were turned into
stiff
leather stocks,
And people wore pigtails
instead
of
perukes,
Brown Bess never altered her
iron-grey locks.
She knew she was valued for
more
than
her looks.
"Oh, powder and patches was
always my
dress,
And I think I am killing
enough,"
said Brown Bess . . .
For a long moment I considered adding this Bess to my arsenal of
whodunit artifacts, but one look at the price tag -- $8,650 --
squelched that thought.
It was enough just to caress the patina of the 206-year-old brown steel.
(There are some closeup views of the Cohens' Bess
here.)
End
of a holiday: The
northbound City of New
Orleans awaiting departure from New Orleans station.
