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Why is it that some people (definitely not ALL people) are so mesmerized by watching the world go by? It just hit me this morning... really hard.
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The answer is simple: "The dramatic rock formations persuade me to guess their age." You have a curious mind, and it is constantly working as the world passes before your gaze.
Posts: 2236 | From: Evanston, Ill. and Ontonagon, Mich. | Registered: Feb 2007
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I like to imagine who lives in some of the remote ranches and where do those dirt roads we cross go? On my first trip, I took binoculars and spent a lot of time pondering those questions. I also took 3 books and never opened them!
-------------------- My new "default" station (EKH) has no baggage service or QuikTrak machine, but the parking is free! And the NY Central RR Museum is just across the tracks (but not open at Amtrak train times. . ..) Posts: 337 | From: Goshen, IN | Registered: Jun 2006
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I have to look out the window on a train; if I'm stuck with an aisle seat, I will go to the cafe car and camp out next to a window there for as long as possible.
-------------------- Ocala Mike Posts: 1530 | From: Ocala, FL | Registered: Dec 2006
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My mother once told me that, during long distance family train trips, she would often wake up in the dead of night to see me sitting bolt upright with my nose literally pressed to the window.
Apparently, I also had spooky obsession with seeing the inside of Buffalo Central Terminal, still open for business back then. On more than one trip, my schoolboy self had to be physically restrained from getting off the train at 2AM to take a look.
These days, I travel frequently from the east coast to the west. I take trains just so I can look out the window -- virtually non-stop from dawn until long after dark. I never read. I never listen to music. I just look. It's a form of deep meditation, I guess.
And while I'm not an unsociable traveler, I always find sharing a dining car table with fellow passengers a slight drag, since they distract me from gazing out the window. I have to admit that I leave every onboard meal slightly frustrated, wondering about the sights I missed.
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For the same reason you are mesmerized by riding a train and writing about it.
Posts: 2355 | From: Pleasanton, CA | Registered: Apr 2007
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My last time in an airplane was in summer of 2001 from San Diego to Minneapolis. It was a beautiful clear day with a new plane and a great crew. Then they asked everyone to close their window curtain so they could show a movie. I refused. I also never flew again.
Posts: 1572 | From: St. Paul, MN | Registered: Dec 2002
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The same experience has happened to me as well, Mr. Twin Star; KLAS-KORD, window seat forward of the wing, perfect visibility, view of Lake Mead and the Grand Canyon.....OH,OH; time for some mindless movie "please close your window shade, sir", I did - don't need to go to jail over that.
Only difference is I still fly as it is simply not convenient to use rail for most of my trips.
But to close with a return to topic, since my annual overnight trip seems to be Auto Train (the '08 and '10 joyrides were years I didn't go to Florida), I'm "not exactly" glued to see a new varietal of lineside vegetation.
Finally to Mr. Dilly; from reviewing your postings, it appears you are regularly a Sleeper rider; so when do you sleep?
Posts: 9975 | From: Clarendon Hills, IL USA (BNSF Chicago Sub MP 18.71) | Registered: Apr 2002
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I'll cite once again an Amtrak travel poster which I saw once in Washington Union Station....
"Where your love of the recliner meets your love of the great outdoors."
I carry a book or two when I travel......just to fill the waiting room time or the unexpected delays one encounters (such as waiting 90 minutes for a sticky drawbridge to get unstuck) enroute. While the train is moving, at least during waking hours, I rarely, rarely manage any reading.
-------------------- David Pressley
Advocating for passenger trains since 1973!
Climbing toward 5,000 posts like the Southwest Chief ascending Raton Pass. Cautiously, not nearly as fast as in the old days, and hoping to avoid premature reroutes. Posts: 4203 | From: Western North Carolina | Registered: Feb 2004
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quote:Originally posted by Gilbert B Norman: Mr. Dilly; from reviewing your postings, it appears you are regularly a Sleeper rider; so when do you sleep?
I close the curtains with extreme reluctance, long after dark, once my "Glowing Jesus" nightlight and I finally reach the point where we need toothpicks to prop open our eyelids.
I'm always up at first light, and I'm often the first passenger to walk into the dining car for breakfast. The bonus is that I frequently have a table all to myself, and can study the scenery in total serenity -- without the not-unpleasant but nevertheless distracting presence of other humans.
Now if I could just figure out a way to continue gazing out the window while I'm fast asleep, in the restroom, taking a shower, or walking through the train. . . .
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For those of us who do like to window gaze, be it on a plane, train, or ship, I was pleased to see a GPS tracking system on the seat back screen on a recent Delta flight. It showed intended course, miles to go/completed, and current location. It was very satisfying to know what that small town down there was (and then to try and check for any rail yards)! A few years ago the Talgo train to Vancouver had it too, though not as sophisticated. Wonder if its still in use?
Posts: 2397 | From: Camden, SC | Registered: Mar 2006
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Dilly don't care if it rains or freezes s'long as he's got his "glowing Jesus".......
-------------------- David Pressley
Advocating for passenger trains since 1973!
Climbing toward 5,000 posts like the Southwest Chief ascending Raton Pass. Cautiously, not nearly as fast as in the old days, and hoping to avoid premature reroutes. Posts: 4203 | From: Western North Carolina | Registered: Feb 2004
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The pleasure for me TG, is that I can look away and look back. As a single parent I drive my kids everywhere, and myself to three offices three different days. So I can't look away at the sites/sights much. Even on a road trip it means pulling over. So when i take the train, there is an endless supply of things to look at and wonder about, and also for me - to let go of and never know about: back roads and houses and small towns and city neighborhoods and mooners, day or night. I can look and close my eyes and dnot worry about crashing or falling asleep while driving.
I wrote/posted a trainku here some years ago, that was something like this:
Lest I miss the moon The California Zephyr Shakes me from my sleep.
Ira
Posts: 300 | From: Denver, CO USA | Registered: Aug 2000
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I too am mesmerized by the view, but not everyone who rides Amtrak is the same. I once had dinner on the Zephyr with a woman dermatologist who was on her way to a convention in San Francisco. We had just completed the run from Denver to Grand Junction. I asked her how she enjoyed the scenery, and she replied, "What scenery ?". I said, "The mountains". She answered, "I'm not much on scenery". That ended our conversation.
Posts: 133 | From: Canaan, CT | Registered: Dec 2004
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One of the best things about a sleeper (unlike coach) is that you can shut off all light to see outside better through the night. When I can I travel at the full moon. Salt Lake to Winnemucca was wonderful by moonlight.
And I always make it to the sightseer lounge for a 360 degree view of the sunrise. ...(Another reason for sleeper - coffee before 6:30).
Posts: 1572 | From: St. Paul, MN | Registered: Dec 2002
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I once took a CZ trip from Chicago to Emeryville and back with my elder son, who spent the entire trip both ways in our roomette studying for the LSAT. Didn't look out the window once. Afterward, he said it was the best train trip he'd ever taken. Maybe that's true--he's now a honcho in the Justice Department in Washington.
My younger son, however, spent our later trip glued to the window, taking in everything that he saw. He later became a reporter and is now in corporate communications.
One never knows, does one?
Posts: 2236 | From: Evanston, Ill. and Ontonagon, Mich. | Registered: Feb 2007
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In March 1994 I took a roundtrip from Washington, DC - Denver, CO...... two nights in roomette each way..... and used the bulk of my time writing the first draft for a 60-page seminar paper which was due in early April. (rode the Capitol westbound, Cardinal eastbound.)
It was a great trip given that I had the time and privacy neccessary to work without interruption for hours at a time.
As this was the 'pre-laptop' era, I was working the old-fashioned way with notes on 3x5 index cards. I brought along a roll of scotch tape and plastered my walls with notes which were all within easy reach and which could be shifted from one section to another and back as the rough draft took shape.
The trip rated an A+, my visit with an old friend in Denver a solid A, and the paper a respectable A-.
-------------------- David Pressley
Advocating for passenger trains since 1973!
Climbing toward 5,000 posts like the Southwest Chief ascending Raton Pass. Cautiously, not nearly as fast as in the old days, and hoping to avoid premature reroutes. Posts: 4203 | From: Western North Carolina | Registered: Feb 2004
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I wrote the better part of four mystery novels while riding the trains, mostly the CZ, Builder, and Chief. The privacy of a roomette and the gentle jolting of the train loosens the cap of the creativity jar. Also rooms in Glenwood Springs and in the Izaak Walton Inn contribute to the ambience.
Alex Haley (that old Coast Guardsman and the author of "Roots" and "The Autobiography of Malcolm X") couldn't write unless he was in a tiny cabin aboard a tramp steamer. Now that's easy to understand.
Posts: 2236 | From: Evanston, Ill. and Ontonagon, Mich. | Registered: Feb 2007
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Well - I'll take it as flattery to have something in common with Alex Haley and with you also Henry.
I recall a preface in which Garrison Keillor wrote of spending the proceeds from his first big article on a family trip aboard the Empire Builder and then leaving his briefcase containing his notes for what would surely be his best story ever in the washroom at King Street Station. He knows that this was going to be his best story ever because nothing he has written since has seemed quite as good as the one he lost in Seattle.
-------------------- David Pressley
Advocating for passenger trains since 1973!
Climbing toward 5,000 posts like the Southwest Chief ascending Raton Pass. Cautiously, not nearly as fast as in the old days, and hoping to avoid premature reroutes. Posts: 4203 | From: Western North Carolina | Registered: Feb 2004
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Like TwinStar, I enjoy just looking out the window of my sleeper and enjoying the night sky as I (hopefully) fall asleep. A 25mg Doxylamine (Unisom) also helps, in this regard.
Another thing I find interesting is a little AM radio "DXing"..i.e., putting a radio up beside the window and seeing how many long distance radio stations I can pull in. I always use headphones as to not disturb passengers in neighboring sleeper units. If you get east of the Sierras or east of the Rocky Mountains, it is amazing what distance stations you can hear at night.
Richard
Posts: 1909 | From: Santa Rosa | Registered: Jan 2004
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Two of my most vivid memories are looking out the window of the Silver Star at night in 1969 and watching a light shine in the distance and wondering what it was...a town, a house, a business? That light was visible for several minutes and when we finally drew within a few hundred yards of it, I confirmed it was a back yard light on a pole behind a house in a remote area. Later as we sped through small towns I noticed the blueish tint of TV sets inside windows of country homes and wondered what the residents were watching that night. Sunrise aboard the northbound Silver Star in North Carolina in the same era revealed wet dew on farmlands and tractors already hard at work plowing fields. This evoked thoughts about what life must be like in that region. I think train windows reveal a lot as they let you observe and ponder all kinds of thoughts.
Posts: 561 | Registered: Jul 2003
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Looking out the window while northbound on the City of New Orleans there was a father with a 3-4 year old son waving at our train. They got into their old beat up ford pickup and met us at about a half dozen rail crossings waving at each one. When I recall this scene my minds eye sees it in black and white as though it were a half century ago.
Posts: 229 | From: Long Beach CA | Registered: Jan 2007
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