posted
OK, first, I am not an experienced writer of these "travel logs", but wanted to share my wife and I's experience on our trip via Amtrak this past week.
I had posted a couple of times of our coming trip and was really excited about not only visiting Washington and New York, but the overnight trip on the Crescent as well. I had used Amtrak from WAS to NYP once before, but just in coach.
We took the #20 Crescent out of Atlanta Sunday night the 13th of February. The Atlanta station resembles a bus station in small town USA. It only has about 5 parking spots out front and one gate. I guess that is all is needed though with only two trains daily. Our train was delayed about an hour departing, as we left around 9:15 pm. We had a roomette on a Viewliner for ATL to WAS and the return NYP to ATL. The accomodations were good for us. We had room for our 4 carry-on (medium size) bags. At times it was cramped, but much better than coach for an overnight trip and cheaper than the deluxe room.
We had dinner shortly after boarding, which was very good. I had the NY strip steak which was excellent. The free meals for roomettes and deluxe rooms is a nice bonus.
The bunks gave plenty of room to sleep, but it took us a while to adjust. The stretch of track from about Greenville, SC to Greensboro, NC was by far much more bumpy and jerky than any other part of the trip. I probably slept about 3 hours total on the way to WAS, off and on, mainly because of the adjustment to train travel and the anticipation of the trip. This improved on the way home.
The train was delayed another hour or so near Charlotte at about 3 am. We finally got moving around 4 am and rolled through Charlottesville, Culpepper and Manassas, Virginia early Monday morning. We had a solid breakfast at 6:30 am.
We pulled into Union Station in DC around 11:30 am, almost two hours late. But that was great for us as we couldn't check into the hotel until about 1 pm anyway. We had lunch at Johnny Rocket's at Union Station. We were impressed with Union Station. It's very nice and offers alot of great shops restaurants. We got alot of good pictures of the interior, which was greatly restored a few years back.
We stayed in DC for 3 nights and saw just about everything. We used the Metro subway system, which I highly recommend. It get's you just about everywhere in the city. It is very clean and safe. They have unlimited daily passes for $6.50 (good after 9:30 am until 12 midnight). We saw all the monuments, White House, etc.
Thursday the 17th we headed for Penn Station in New York on the Acela Express 2158. It left on time at 9:05 and arrived early at 11:30 am. We rode in the Quiet Car, which was outstanding. No cell phones!! Yea!! The car was squeaky clean and a smooth ride. We'd certainly recommend the Acela for those considering a quick day-trip or ride from WAS to NYP.
We took the subway to the Waldorf Astoria. We used the 7-day metro card with the NY subway. It was a quick "welcome to New York" with the grime and rudeness of the New York subway. But, hey, it wouldn't be New York without that. It didn't bother me at all and actually enjoyed travelling place to place on the subway. There were a good many incidents on the subway system while we were in New York on the news at night, but not near us.
We saw the city, from the top of the Empire State Building, to Times Square, Good Morning America, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Central Park, Grand Central, etc. It was great walking through Grand Central. It makes you wonder how great the old Penn Station was that was demolished in the late '60s. It's a shame it didn't survive.
We only took two trips by taxi while in NYC, so we almost did the entire trip by rail (Amtrak and subways). It is great to be able to travel and not deal with traffic and airports.
We left on Sunday the 20th after three nights in Manhattan on the southbound #19 Crescent. It left on time at 2:50 pm and was on time the whole way home, arriving a little ahead of schedule at 8:35 am in Atlanta. We changed locomotives in WAS. DC was interesting from the train as you can see the Jefferson and Washington Memroials very well from the tracks in and out of WAS. The Memorials were beautiful at night as we departed south Sunday night.
There are some good views on the Crescent, though rarely spectacular. You get a good view of Philadelphia if you are on the east side of the train. Same for seeing Manhattan as you head towards NYP from Newark. You definitely see some of the poor parts of the country as well, just outside of Baltimore and parts of New Jersey. Some rough looking places no doubt. The stretch through Virginia is pretty and you go through some neat old towns.
Well, that's about all I've got. Hope some of you enjoyed reading this. I would certainly recommend the Crescent and the entire trip. We booked way in advance on the Amtrak website and the rail travel was only $700 for the two of us for the entire trip, which was a great bargain in my opinion. By the way, I did sleep almost 7 full hours uninterupted on the way back, which was a great improvement from the trip up, but it does take some getting used to.
Look forward to our next trip sometime in the future!!
Posts: 12 | From: Mableton, Georgia | Registered: Jan 2005
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posted
Good report, Buzz!! Sounds like you enjoyed your AMTRAK experience!! Thank you for posting!
Posts: 2428 | From: Grayling, MI | Registered: Mar 2002
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