The 70 Hour Train Ride

When I booked my train from Emeryville, CA to Buffalo, NY I didn't really think about spending 70 hours in transit going from one coast to nearly the other coast. As I got closer to leaving, I began dreading the thought of three whole days on a train. Now, with the train ride behind me, seeming to have passed in a blink of an eye, I'm pretty glad I chose the overland route instead off the fly over option.

Wednesday morning I actually rode my bike to the Amtrak station in a light rain and found that using the Amtrak box was incredibly easy (I was skeptical about showing up and disassembling on the spot, but it was just removing the pedals and adjusting the bars to fit, although the bars didn't fit all that well, next time I might pull them off completely, which isn't even much more). From there it was embarking on an even older form of cross country than cycling, taking the rails straight across the country.

The Central Valley of California I mostly slept through, it didn't matter anyway, the rain was regular all the way to the Sierras. I could only make out a few acres of farmland passing through one of the soil richest parts of the country (most of America's vegetables and fruits comes from the Central Valley of California). I woke up as we started climbing through the Sierras, again the rain hampered the far off views of looming mountains and I was beginning to be disappointed at the weather. My only choice was to watch the pine trees pass by, but just as I felt like retreating to my seat from the sightseer lounge the ground dropped out from the right of the train and the Sierra's stood in all their beauty.

The pine trees now blanketed into a steady evergreen climbing up the contours of the brown mountains. The trees then eventually started to get few and far between as the ground began to shoot straight up and then eventually the summit was bare of trees, existing above the timber line. I also watched all these Forestry roads pass by, realizing that this truly is backcountry cycle touring heaven, I cannot wait til I can come back here with a bike.

Snow in the Sierras. 

Feet up, watching the view.

Truckee, CA.

At this point we began going down to Nevada, this side had way less vegetation, but still had great views of stunning rocky valleys. By the time we hit the deserts of Nevada the sun was already passing over the bare dry mountains of Nevada. The sunlight reflected off the miles of brown dirt and passed through the horizon in an orange haze that looked like all those idyllic desert sunsets seen in old time Western movies.

More pics of the Sierras.

Sun going down outside Reno, NV.

Over night the train raced along the Nevada and Utah deserts, which probably was not terrible, although I wish I could have at least seen Salt Lake City, but that's not the end of the world, especially with the Rockies coming up. The morning was spent in the deserts of East Utah, but then in the morning the train crossed into Colorado, now following the river of the same name. The Colorado at this point was a mere trickle to what it would eventually turn into the flowing rapids of Arizona. Even so the river had, over the millions of years, had worn down the ground into a beautiful swooping red rock valley filled with eagles and other birds of prey crashing into the green rivers of Colorado.

Utah Desert.

The red rock that this state was named for.

The Colorado River.

As we began to climb away from the desert the Colorado River began to lose even more if it's power. As we got higher the water got thinner, eventually getting lost entirely, rather from us turning away from it, or it literal being the headwaters of this 1,400 mile long river. But it hardly seemed noticeable as the river disappeared because in its place the Rockies appeared, first slowly peaking over the foothills, then coming into full view. It seemed the smaller the Colorado became the larger the Rockies became and eventually we were in that wilderness of the Rocky Mountains, staring up at this mountain ranges highest summits covered in snow. The train curved and cut through the mountains as it attempted to find a course of the gentlest slopes (I believe this part was part of the original transcontinental line). These mountains appeared to me as what I always imagined the Rockies to be, made up of jagged grey rock reaching to the sky.

Watching the train bend ahead.

The West.

Second sunset of the ride.

We eventually reached our highest peak inside the Moffat Tunnel, at 9,000 ft underground (the bag of chips I had looked ready to explode from the change of pressure). Six miles in the tunnel and we exited out into the east side of the Continental Divide. From there we descended down into Denver, looking over the lights of Boulder as the sun once again began its trip behind the horizon. Two days so far on the train and time was moving as swift as the train was.

The following day was not much to see. It was now corn country and that's what I saw, corn. Lots of it. The only sights left on the Zephyr was the Chicago skyline coming in. I was glad to have the day off the train in Chicago, where I caught up with an old friend and ate some delicious vegan food at the Chicago Diner (so glad I could make it there again). Around 9 PM I hopped on the Lake Shore Limited, finishing up with an overnighter to Buffalo.