Day One: San Francisco to Utah

The Great American Train Ride

Por Nathan Tsai

25 de May de 2021

The Beginning

In March, when COVID vaccines became more plentiful and infection rates were decreasing rapidly, I started to plan for travel again. At that point, it had been more than a year since I had set foot outside the Bay Area and I was itching to get out and about.

An item that's been on my bucket list has been to travel across the United States by train. In the past, I've dismissed it as a practical method of travel as train tickets are expensive and the extra time it adds to tight schedules often lowers its value. However, thanks to COVID, ticket prices were at an all-time low and I didn't mind taking a bit of extra time to avoid getting packed into a sardine can of an airplane.

I checked my schedule, found an opening to travel, and booked my tickets that night. With that, at the end of May, backpack in hand, I set off on an intercontinental trip.

The Plan

This trip across the United States could theoretically be completed by just taking just two trains. I would take the California Zephyr from San Francisco (Emeryville Station) to Chicago (Union Station) and then from Chicago to Boston (South Station). However, as Amtrak is still operating in a limited capacity thanks to COVID, I would have to break up my trip into four legs.

I would travel from San Francisco to Denver (leg one), Denver to Chicago (leg two), Chicago to Washington DC (leg three) and Washington DC to Boston (leg four). In total, if everything went perfectly, I would traverse roughly 3500 miles over 77 hours of travel. Yes, this would be slower than just driving the same distance, but factoring in the time spent eating and sleeping on the road, the timetable for a train didn't actually look too bad.

In between the train-ing, I would be spending a few days in Denver, Chicago, and a week or so in Boston. I hoped to use this as an opportunity to see more of the United States, eat interesting food, and stretch my traveling muscles after a year of hibernation.

Landscapes

The California Zephyr is one of the most famous train lines in the entire United States. I'll speak to the history of the line itself a bit more in the next post, but it crosses over both the Rocky Mountains and the Sierra Nevadas and as a result, some of the landscapes that whizz by are absolutely stunning. In between mountain ranges, the train thunders through forests, deserts, grasslands, marshes, and towns.

The first day, we flashed straight through California's grasslands and the Sierra Nevadas by way of the Emigrant Gap. Once we crossed over into Nevada, the terrain became starkly desertified and the deep blue skies contrasted sharply with the ashen golden dust.

Abandoned Things

The train runs through towns that boomed and busted decades ago. To that end, I saw piles of abandonment along the sides of the railroad. Whether it be buildings, vehicles, or even entire towns, scenes of urban migration and the gradual impoverishment of rural areas was clear to see.

Abandoned People

Trash was not the only thing being left by the wayside.

Other Trains

Every so often, the entire train would rumble and shake as another train -- normally a freight train -- would roar on by as it headed in the opposite direction.

My Train

Three engine cars pulled a motley collection of passenger, lounge, and dining cars along for the ride. Amtrak has long been in financial distress and unfortunately, the train cars themselves are getting quite old now. For years, Amtrak has been desperately repairing just enough to make sure the trains don't completely break down on the tracks.

For the first leg of the trip, the "Superliner" cars I rode in were originally manufactured in 1981. The train crew and operations team work 24/7 to keep the trains running and in safe condition. On the interior, switches and panels were molded from thick, grey sheets of plastic, the upholstery and carpet were mostly stain-free but faded, and the doors and seats creaked with age.

However, my experience was more than comfortable and I loved sleeping on the train. It's the land version of sleeping on a boat; at night, the train rocks gently from side to side and there's a constant hum of white noise generated from the distant thunder of the engines.

Lunch and Dinner

Since travel by train almost always has a more efficient alternative , folks who ride trains long distance tend to be a bit strange (yes me included) and often have interesting stories to share. The dining car frequently became the watering hole for passengers to exchange travel stories and life lessons with one another over a luxurious hot meal cooked to order by a chef in the dining car.

With reduced revenue from lack of travel, Amtrak cut their chefs and with COVID restrictions still in place, passengers did not congregate to chat. Additionally, when possible, meals were served in the rooms instead of the dining car to further limit exposure. All this is well and good when it comes to disease prevention and it certainly made me feel safer, but as a result, the food that was served was glorified airplane food and most of us ate it in a small, dimly lit room by ourselves.

The Red Wine Braised Beef (on the left) was served with polenta, pearl onions, carrots, and green beans. This was quite good. The beef and sauce had a texture akin to "chunky" Campbell stew beef, but it was savory, soft, and its flavor was reasonably reminiscent of beef. The real star of the show were the carrots and the onions as they absorbed a significant amount of beef essence and were juicy and sweet at the same time. While the polenta was completely textureless and flavorless, it did a good job mopping up the brown sauce and providing a bit of stomach-filling carbohydrates.

The Chicken Fettuccini (on the right) was definitely a step down from the beef. Unfortunately, pasta just doesn't reheat very well in a microwave. Parts of the pasta were a bit dry and chalky while the center of the pasta was soft and pasty. The cream sauce conveyed more saltiness than it did creaminess. Unlike the veggies in the beef, the carrots, broccoli, and bell peppers didn't have the luxury of reheating in a braising liquid and as a result, they ended up a bit dry and tough. However, the chicken was still soft and moist and the texture oddly enough was like jerked chicken.

Overall, not too bad. Not too good.

Bridges

So. Many. Bridges.

Power Lines and Utility Poles

I find that manmade objects can lend to a certain contrast to the landscape. While nature prefers to be messy and random with plants and trees scattered close to the ground, manmade objects like utility poles stand starkly upright and straight against the clutter of nature.

Sunset over the Desert

The sun was setting as we entered the Great Salt Lake Desert. As the light faded to darkness, I fell asleep, eager to see what the next day would bring.