Small Disasters, Part II

The train ride to Seattle was full of bounces and jolts. The view of passing scenery outside my room's window varied from small towns to farmland to forested mountains. Because the ride took over thirty hours, we slept in our quarters not long after dark, which occured somewhere around Oakland.

The thing about the American trains is they are distinctly low-tech. Our sleeper car was constructed by the Canadian Bombardier corporation in the 70s. There's no wifi, and cell phones function sporadically. TV or music in your room? Forget about it... Unless you bring your own. There was something called a Dig-E-Player available for rent, but I didn't bother with it. The true entertainment was constantly rolling by outside my window.

There are some nice touches on the train. The sleeper car connects to a dining car, a view car, a lounge car, and a parlour car. Harold really enjoyed the view car. I was glad I got the "handicapped discount" on my tickets, because I couldn't access any of those cars. To get out of the sleeper car, you have to climb a stairwell and cross a tube into the next car. Harold told me that the floor of that tube goes up, down and sideways like a funhouse. Definitely not wheelchair-friendly.

Nevertheless, I found the Amtrak staff to be friendly and helpful. Olga, our attendant, furnished me with food, made the beds, and brought the morning paper each day. The food varied from omelettes for breakfast, to hamburgers for lunch and salmon for dinner. Overall, I'd rate the cuisine onboard as far superior to airline food, because it's cooked fresh in the train's kitchen. It's about on a par with the offerings at a chain restaurant like Denny's.

In the afternoons, around 3:00pm, the staff holds a wine tasting event that is free for all sleeper car passengers. Olga was very concientious in bringing me the wine, cheese and crackers.

We passed through some big cities, probably the largest being Portland, Oregon. I thought the cityscape was fascinating, with its industrial demeanor. Harold found it ugly. I had a hard time convincing him to take pictures of the downtown area.

We arrived at Seattle around 10:30 Saturday night. The bus to Vancouver was scheduled to depart at 11:00. When Harold and I got to the bus, people were already boarding. We met the bus driver and he took a quizzical look at my chair. "Uh, we don't have a lift, eh?"

"What?" I asked. Some dialog with the driver ensued, in which we discovered Amtrak somehow missed the fact my ticket was marked for disabled access. After some conversations with the Amtrak station manager at Seattle, we agreed to stay overnight and travel by train the next day.

So, there we were at midnight, the only folks in Seattle's King St. Station, except for the manager and some homeless guy picking through trash. The manager agreed to put us up at the local Holiday Inn Express, but there was another problem. No disabled-transit buses were available that late at night. In desperation, the Amtrak manager convinced the on-call supervisor of the local paratransit agency to transport us to the hotel, at 2:00am.

By the time we rolled into the Holiday Inn, it was almost pointless to try to sleep. We scheduled bus pickup at 5:30am and bagged our three hours of z's. It makes me yawn just thinking about it.

The good thing, though, was we got to travel by train to Vancouver at 7:30 in the morning. The train follows the coast, and the conductor--well versed in local lore of the route--filled us in on the scenery's attributes. One of the main facts he noted on the trip through rural Washington was the dilapidated family farms along the tracks. Corporate farming has ruined the family farms, which are falling into elegant ruin as the countryside reclaims its own territort. I somehow knew how the Romans must have felt, traveling along their dilapidated highways in the Fourth Century, gazing at deserted villas and fallen temples.

We finally arrived at Vancouver's Amtrak/Bus station around 10:30 that morning. The weather reminded me of San Diego in late November or December: cool (low 60s), with bright sunlight glinting off the windows and sidewalks. One feature of Vancouver I'll always remember with fondness is that bright, sunny, fresh feel to the air. San Diego is a city a lot like Vancouver in many ways, but where we have dust and smog, they have bright blue skies and clean breezes. Yes--it does rain (about 4.5 feet a year), but so what? I'd love more rain at home.

Vancouver is quite unique in that about 25% of the taxis are accessible. "Handicapable" as Stellar might call them. So, we called a taxi from my cell phone, and it arrived about a half-hour later. Most of the taxi drivers in Vancouver are Indian or Middle Eastern. It's really cool to be picked up by one of the Sikh drivers, who look like they came straight out of the era of the Raj.

Our hotel was conveniently located in central Vancouver. It was close to downtown, if not quite in downtown. Kind of like renting a room in Hillcrest or Mission Valley, if you visit San Diego.

More on the week in Vancouver, next installment.

-- David