There is no doubt about it. I’ve been mesmerized by trains by entire married life. Oh, it wasn’t all fun and games, and I didn’t always like it. Growing up in Union County, I didn’t have much interaction with trains. It was easier to hop on a bus to Port Authority in New York or take the Number #8 bus to go to Elizabeth to shop in Goerke’s or visit Humes Music Store. As kids, we never took a train anyplace; family vacations to the White Mountains of New Hampshire were by car, two days of travel, an overnight in Connecticut and arriving at this magical wonderful Burroughs Farm in Twin Mountain, NH early afternoon the second day. It was exciting. But then I married a fireman on the railroad. Jimmy, like his dad, worked for the Pennsylvania Railroad. It was a time when you hired out you hired as a fireman…and yes, there were steam engines, and yes, Jimmy really did shovel coal and sweat by the fire pit even on the coldest days. It would be years until he had the seniority to be ‘promoted’ to engineer. In between, the PRR became the Penn Central Railroad, the government stepped in and Conrail became the ‘freight’ railroad, and firemen and engineers had their choice…did they want to be Conrail engineers or Amtrak engineers, the new government railroad. Jimmy was already an engineer and he chose Amtrak, he liked running passenger trains, liked the trips to Washington, D.C, layovers in Philadelphia where he could visit museums before bringing another train back to New York, and liked the fact we would then have passes to travel wherever Amtrak ran. Even then, we never took many train trips. Jimmy didn’t want to spend his time off as a passenger on a train another engineer was running. Even with passes, we never got to take our children cross country, or even to the nation’s Capital by train. Jimmy believes the train was for work, not for pleasure. And he worked hard for his pay. At the time, there were no sick days, no holidays, no days off. If you didn’t work, you simply didn’t get paid. So he was very healthy all those years we were raising four children and putting them in tuition paid Catholic schools. He called in sick for our daughter’s cheerleading meets, our son’s Pop Warner games. Looking back, I’m so happy he had the option and we both recognized enjoying our kids’ activities beat a bigger paycheck any day. My train trips while Jimmy was alive were glorious when I took them. Often, when Jimmy had a run to Washington, DC, a four or five hour layover there, and another trip back to New York. I could go as a passenger, meet him at Union Station, and we could spend a couple of hours visiting the Smithsonian and having lunch in one of the Capitol’s restaurants before boarding his train for our trip back home. I loved it, and so loved the Smithsonian and visited every building, in addition to the Library of Congress and the Capitol many times. We took several trips after the Auto Train came into being, driving to Lorton, Virginia, boarding the train and watching them board our car, for the overnight trip to Florida, then reclaiming our vehicle and moving on to wherever we were going. Wonderful trips. After Jimmy’s death, both to memorialize him and our happy memories, and to travel….so easy to travel by train when you’re a lone woman traveler…I knew I wanted to take the train across the country! At least once! I ended up doing it more than that. I took one trip to New Orleans since I was also taking a cruise sailing out of there. What better way to start a cruise on the Mississippi than by taking the train to the boat! t was an opportunity to see the beauty and wonder of America through 11 states and Washington, D.C. There simply isn’t anything that can compare! Boarding in New York…Amtrak’s Crescent is one of the few long distance East Coast trains that doesn’t stop at Metro Park…you whiz through New Jersey, Philadelphia, Delaware and Maryland before stopping for a few minutes in Washington, D.C where dozens more board for the trip South through Virginia, the Carolinas, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi and final stop, New Orleans. Rather than the straight line south leaving the nation’s Capital, the Crescent travels west through Virginia, giving riders the opportunity to ride through the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains, smack through the middle of towns like Manassas and Culpeper, Jefferson’s Charlottesville, before moving on through High Point and Charlotte in North Carolina, touching on Spartanburg and Clemson in South Carolina, and on to the beautiful city of Atlanta, Georgia. Alabama’s small towns along the route include Anniston, where Anniston Army Depot, a huge Army installation with dozens of tanks lining a perimeter near the railroad, Birmingham and Tuscaloosa, home of the University of Alabama, then on to Meridian, Picayune and more in Mississippi before pulling into the Festival City of the World, New Orleans. The Crescent is the only Amtrak train that makes this route, and timing of the trains going north and south makes it possible to see different towns by night and day. Heading south, you’re just about entering Virginia at dusk, and sleeping your way through the Carolinas, with the sun rising over Georgia and an evening arrival New Orleans. On the return trip, it’s daylight from New Orleans through Georgia, then sleeping once again through the Carolinas, and daylight through the beautiful western side of Virginia and the upper Southern states for a noon-time or so arrival in New York. Accommodations aboard Amtrak are delightful, whether you opt for coach, sleeping cars, or, in between, business class accommodations which mean more space, quiet and comfort than the more popular and less expensive coaches, but still a lower cost and privacy than the private miniature cabins for two. All classes of travel on the Crescent enjoy the same dining room and lounge cars, and seats in both coach and business allow plenty of room for stretching out and lying flat. In recent years, I’ve traveled overnight both ways, in coach and in a private bedroom. Both have distinctive benefits. The coach seats are far less expensive, the seats are wide, big and lay back, and you can bring pillows or blankets for added comfort at night. You have the joy of meeting other travelers, making new friends, and everyone is polite and quite throughout the sleep hours when the lights are dimmed. The private cars of course give you all the privacy you want, two seats and a table for playing games, reading, or holding a glass of wine, and a porter who comes in and converts those two seats to a most comfortable bed at night., You meet your new friends in the dining room where the menu always has a minimum of five entrees and great desserts. It’s elegance on wheels. On the Crescent, it’s in Georgia in the right season, when you first see spring has arrived in the South, with magnolias in bloom, violet and white wisteria blowing gently in the breeze along tree limbs, and dogwood and bulb flowers adding brilliant colors to an already beautiful scenery. As in most large cities, the train stations are right in the heart of things, so it’s always an inexpensive cab ride to hotels of all price ranges, and museums, shops, restaurants and other entertainment you can start enjoying immediately. After all, it was a most relaxing, enjoyable, and scenic trip to get there.

While seeing the United States traveling on any train is a great way to explore the diversity that’s always on display here, the awe doesn’t really start until you leave Denver, Colorado, and begin to climb even higher into the Rocky Mountains! Denver may well be the Mile High city, but that’s only a couple of hundred feet over 5,000 feet. The California Zephyr climbs another 5,000 feet and you can see and feel it happening as you leave this city with its beautiful houses track-side and its distant view of rugged, rocky mountains. Rockies snow distance But there are sights before then! The Zephyr, officially train 5 westbound, is named for the Greek God of the west wind, the gentlest of all winds and the harbinger of spring; there’s no doubt riding on this can literally blow you away with awe at the beauty of it all. It’s also the name of the original train ride once known as the most talked about train in America back in the 1940s when it was operated jointly by at least three different railroads. Now strictly an Amtrak train, it makes the trip once a day between Chicago and Emeryville, California, and from there, a short bus ride to San Francisco. Not wanting to step foot into a sanctuary city, I opted to get off in Sacramento, about 85 miles northeast and the capital of the state since the Gold Rush of the 1840s. Today‘s Zephyr isn’t as luxurious or elegant as the Pullman cars of the past, but it’s so much more efficient, so much quieter and smoother, and of course, given the absence of coal-fired steam engines, so much cleaner. Very much like the Capitol Limited to Chicago, there are both coach and roomette cars, a lounge and dining room shared by customers in both, a downstairs area in the lounge car for snacks, sandwiches and breakfast pastries and beverages. Roomettes, for one or two persons, are two comfortable facing seats in front of large windows, and small storage area for a suitcase as well as an area to support beverages or snacks. At night, another bed drops down from above, and the two seats convert to a lower bunk, all comfortable, fitted with clean sheets and blankets, and several pillows. There are both overhead and reading lights and an intercom they say provides music, though I‘ve yet to find one that’s operable. Bathrooms are either down the hall or down a flight of stairs where a shower room is also located. The larger, more expensive bedrooms for two or more have a small private bathroom within. Rockies dry side Leaving the Windy City, you travel alongside the Chicago River heading to Naperville, an old city with new high-tech companies making it also an affluent family-oriented community. Then it’s on through Aurora, Illinois’ second largest city, Princeton, Kewanee, Galva Galesburg and…. not the same as ours, but…..Monmouth, the birthplace of Wyatt Earp. It’s about 170 miles outside Chicago that you cross the mighty Mississippi, the nation’s second longest river and enter Iowa where you’ll pass farms, small communities, lots of cattle, and horses, in spite of freezing temperatures, and see 300 miles of Iowa before entering Nebraska about 11 at night. Since the train’s regular smooth motion is great for sleeping, admittedly, I didn’t see any of the 500 miles we passed through that state before arriving in Colorado just before dawn. Nor did the stops at five different stations, including both Omaha and Lincoln, disturb my sleep, even though some station stops are dearly sought after by smokers who want to step off for a few puffs. They already know at the beginning, and are frequently reminded as well, that there’s no smoking allowed anyplace on the train under assurances the guilty will be escorted off at the next station. Arriving at Colorado just after 7 in the morning, passengers have an extra hour going west, since the Nebraska/Colorado state line is the change from Central to Mountain time. It’s a delightful full day to start out going through the Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge, once an area where chemical weapons were manufactured but since the 1980s a 15,000 acre refuge where you might get to see your first bald eagle sitting erectly high in one of the barren trees. Not far from there is another site that could make you swear off eating beef, once you see all the cattle in the pens waiting for their last ride before going to market. Rockies snow distance It’s leaving Denver that the ohhs and ahhs begin in profusion. For the next 300 miles, there’s nothing but natural beauty, climbing the Rockies, traveling alongside the Colorado River, and passing through cliffs and canyons, to say nothing of tunnels and plains. The splendor and beauty continues throughout the day, and continues into Utah when you cross the line into that state around dinner time. In many areas, the natural beauty is untouched by so much as a road, the mountains so close at times you feel you can tough them. It’s when most people are enjoying not only friendly conversation but sharing the beauty of the moment as they gather in the lounge car to see the side of the mountains directly in front of them, the soaring tops of them through the overhead glass domes of the car. The trip is made even better when volunteers from the National Park Service or railroad history clubs come aboard and point out historic sites and other points of interest along the way. With so much to see, so much to absorb, so much to admire, it’s impossible to soak it all in.

Tunnels are feats of engineering at any level, above or below ground, underwater or high in the mountains. But seeing and going through the more than three dozen tunnels cut through the Rocky Mountains for railroad engines is an unforgettable experience.

Traveling on Amtrak’s California Zephyr through Colorado gives you an entirely new awe and appreciation for engineers, both the train-driving railroad kind and those who design highways, bridges and tunnels.

Seeing the rocky, rugged, oft snow-covered mountains, dipping into the deep and gorgeous chasms, sitting in lounge cars with ceilings made of glass so you can see the tops of the mountains as the train curves gently, and slowly, through the middle or higher of them and then suddenly thrust into the utter blackness of a tunnel in spite of sun-filled skies gives you a little insight into both how gorgeous the United States truly is and how brilliant the minds, how hard the work of laborers, how fortunate we are to have all of that in our lives.

Most of the 31 tunnels you pass through on the Zephyr within the approximate 1,000 miles of Colorado you pass through between its Nebraska and Utah lines are short, all with numbered openings that reflect the order in which they were built, not necessarily the order they come along the route. There are a few more tunnels as you continue through the Wasatch Mountains while traveling the roughly 500 miles through Utah before arriving in Nevada.

Regardless, the Moffet Tunnel is the piece de resistance, if you will.

Built in the 1920s around the same time the Holland and Lincoln tunnels were under construction in New Jersey, the tunnel had been the dream and idea of banker Daniel Moffet from the early 1900s. His purpose was to establish a shorter quicker way from Denver to points west, but designs, engineers, feuds among legislators and lack of funds kept putting off construction for more than 20 years. And though Mr. Moffet died a millionaire, he unfortunately never lived to see the realization of his dream.

In contrast to the Holland and Lincoln tunnels, both about a mile and a half long, the Moffet Tunnel is six miles long! It takes ten minutes to pass through, given the engineer goes at between 30 and 40 miles an hour into the pitch darkness. It’s rather like spelunking in a deep cave in the Blue Ridge Mountains, only on the train it’s the headlight that cuts through blackness rather than a small light on a helmet.

Passengers seem to take the trip in a hushed silence, whether in wonder or reverence, since conversation came to a halt as the train entered the tunnel. The Tunnel crosses the Continental Divide, that line signifying the water basins of North America, where all the rivers west of it flow to the Pacific, and those east of it empty into the Atlantic Ocean.

We had crossed the Mississippi river at the point it separates Illinois from Iowa, and the Missouri, the nation’s longest river, where it separates Iowa from Nebraska. We went from central to mountain time when we crossed from Nebraska into Colorado and could feel and see how the train was climbing once, we left Denver. Passing through the Moffet Tunnel we reached the highest point above sea level, approximately 10,000 feet.

There’s one more treat for the eyes when you emerge from the tunnel into bright sunlight. While on the east side of the tunnel, the rugged mountains were absent of snow earlier this month, their multi-hued brownish coarseness and rugged curves dotted with pines and many other evergreens, suddenly there’s snow filled terrain, ski resorts, and even a ski aerial lift directly over the tracks, strange to see from a train, but must be even more strange for a skier passing over a locomotive on her way to the top of the mountain!

They say the Upper and Lower Gore canyons in Colorado are dramatic to see, accessible only by rail or kayak, and indeed they are. But as you go through the canyons alongside the Colorado River, pass through Fraser which earns its name as the Icebox of America because it never experiences a frost-free season but where they say the fishing for all kinds of trout is unparalleled, and Granby, the Gateway to Rocky Mountain National Park, you’re reaching Dotsero, the halfway point of the trip between Chicago and San Francisco. You pass through New Castle, a former coal mining town where several mine explosions led to the end of the trade.

But a fire still smolders inside and deep down in the mountain because of so many underground explosions from the high level of methane gas. Today, in true American custom and the spirit of rising above grief and destruction, there’s an annual Burning Mountain Festival held in New Castle every autumn.

Several readers have asked that I write some stories about how my husband and I decided to give up full time jobs, a home, a 14-room house in Highlands, being close to our children, and spending ten years traveling throughout the 50 states. Let me start by staying it was the most wonderful ten years of my life. It really started when we were young, were on moderate income and had four children we wanted to see the country, vacation, and enjoy a different way of life. During those incredibly wonderful years we first had a tent, later a ten trailer, and we packed all three, later, four kids, Freckles, our wonderful mixed breed dog, and us into those cramped but cozy quarters and set out to blend family life, new experiences a bit of learning and lots of excitement into a couple of weeks every year. I remember the warmth of campfires as the kids roasted marshmallows, the thrill of catching lobster in Marathon Florida then cooking it over a campfire, the joy of hearing another camper singing Georgia on my Mind as he accompanied himself on the guitar and we all huddled together enjoying new friends. I remember the kids running wild over open fields in New York state, walking on trails in the White Mountains of New Hampshire and making their way through caverns in the Shenandoah mountains of Virginia. I remember White Sands, New Mexico and of course the Must-Stop at South of the Border on the way to Florida. So many happy memories with a family filled with so much love, not only for each other, but for sharing new experiences. The kids grew up, moved on, started their own families and we continued to work, with a life filled with happy memories. So in 1995, after Jimmy recovered miraculously well after four heart attacks, an angioplasty, catherization and quintuple bypass all within 60 hours, we decided God was giving us a message we should change our lifestyle. It was easy to decide what we should do, given all those happy memories with the family. For our 40th wedding anniversary that year, we bought us a 30 foot Flair, a bus-type RV that included a bedroom, bath, living-dining room -kitchen and driving quarters, left our home in the hands of our son and grandson, threw ourselves a going away party and took off. We had no plans where we were going or how or when we would get there. Open road, new adventures, lots of relaxation, plenty of time to learn, enjoy each other’s company, and see as much of the United States as we could were our focus. We carried an atlas with us and a campground guide and after a couple of days of wandering around the familiar areas of New Jersey and Pennsylvania, we hit on a plan: as soon as we arrived in a new state, we would stop at the visitor’s center, pick up all the brochures they had to offer, find a campground close by, pick up a bottle of wine, and settle in for a night or two or three always around 4 in the afternoon. We’d set up our site, put a couple of chairs and a table under the awning outside, poured that glass of wine and begin poring through the brochures. That usually took until well past dark, so we moved back inside, put dinner on to cook and finished reviewing the brochures. By the time dinner was ready, we had decided which attractions, museums, campgrounds, we wanted to see and visit. And that’s how we decided how long we would spend in any one campground. Once we saw everything we wanted to see there, we would pack up, perhaps stop at a grocery store for more supplies, and move on to the next part of the state, or the next state. We learned early some planning made life much easier for us. Jimmy, during his convalescence from all the cardiac procedures, had spent a lot of time watching cooking shows on tv and decided not only did he like to cook, but he was also really good at it! In the few months between his recuperation and our taking to the road, and while I was still working, he would do all the cooking. So it was natural for him to continue it on the road, whether we were cooking over a woodfire outside or the little stove in the RV. The planning part came over more glasses of wine at that kitchen table as we talked about what we wanted for dinner each night. If we were along a coast, we knew we wanted seafood and would wait until we got there to make purchases. But we would plan each meal, pack in the groceries necessary for that week’s menus…..RV refrigerators in the 1990s had limited size freezers so planning became really essential… and stock up before we left in the morning for our next day of travel. It worked perfectly, because we never knew exactly where we would end up that night…..there might be a fair going on in a town along the way we stopped to stop and visit, or a park with some walking paths we thought we’d try. But by 4 p.m. we knew we would stop, have plenty of time to set up our site and still enjoy a leisurely and excellent dinner. It didn’t take many days to put behind us the drudgery of working every day, the routine of taking care of a big house, and the realization we really didn’t need all the accoutrements we had collected, enjoyed and saved through the years. Life in an RV is an exciting experience! Doing it for a decade is a dream come true!

It was four years ago I spent a week aboard America Cruise Line’s paddle wheeler America , but the memories last a lifetime, and the knowledge gained from experts like Bill Wiemuth on the Mississippi River and Bertram Davis, great great grandson of Confederate States President Jefferson Davis, on the Civil War is sheer luxury. Still, the cruise line had one final offer for its satiated and contented customers….a brief tour of New Orleans with an unforgettable stop at a cemetery. Cemeteries in New Orleans are truly cities of the dead, with their vast above ground tombs lined up on either side of the streets, the vaults holding the remains of everyone from Voodoo priestess Marie Leveau to long ago mayors and a pioneer in the sugar industry, Etienne de Bore. Clearly the most popular cemetery in town is St. Louis No. 1 (there are 3) which has been actively accepting the remains of Louisianans since 1789. It’s a complete city block in size, with more than 700 tombs and more than 100,000 bodies in them. Listed on the National Registry of Historic Places, St. Louis #1 is reportedly haunted…no surprise there….and a popular tourist attraction with guides who spiel out delightfully entertaining stories as they weave among the vaults and point out famous family names. A block away from the famed French Quarter of this exciting, colorful and in many ways deviant city that firmly believes in letting the good times roll, St. Louis #1 cemetery tour guides will show you the sealed vaults, the smaller sealed vault tucked away in a corner of the big monument and how each can be opened and re-sealed again to prevent flood waters from getting inside. The smaller doors to a corner of the vault serve another purpose. Each vault only holds one or two bodies, so when the next family member dies, the vault is opened, the remains of the last entombed which by now have turned to dust, are packed away carefully in a small container and reinterred in the little vault in the corner of the bigger one. Kind of an early version of cremation, but explains how more than 100,000 bodies can be buried in a sacred place the size of a city block. If two or three family members die before the first deceased’s body has disintegrated, families simply ask a neighbor if they can borrow their vault for a year or so. Benjamin Latrobe, architect of the US Capitol, also designed a part of St. Louis Cathedral in New Orleans’s Jackson Square and was working on the engineering design for a new waterworks project in New Orleans when he died of yellow fever. His son had died of the same disease three years earlier, and both are entombed in the cemetery. The burial ground is owned by the Catholic diocese and entry is limited to tour groups with storytellers who have been approved by the Bishop. Family members or genealogists can get special permits to enter and walk through the cemetery unattended. Jackson Square is exciting regardless of the hour of day or night, with swarms of people in all manner of dress and habits dancing, playing musical instruments, reading tarot cards, telling fortunes, selling voodoo dolls, all kinds of food, drink and strange smelling cigarettes, painting and selling caricatures or portraits, or simply sitting around watching everyone else. With St. Louis Cathedral the focal point of the Square, it isn’t unusual to see a bride and groom and their entire wedding party and guests come out of the Catholic cathedral and dance their way, complete with anything from a violinist to a mariachi band, through the Square to the applause and congratulations of happy strangers. Many of the brides carry white lace umbrellas and all their guests wave white linen cloths as they wend their way past tourists, artists, booths and stalls throughout the Square. Café du Monde, the open always café best known for its strong coffee and very special beignets, is only a short distance from the Square, but with lines of tourists waiting hours to sit and enjoy those fried donuts, it’s simply not worth the walk. Back in Jackson Square, two of the state’s museums, each dedicated to a different phase of the Pelican State’s history and lore, flank the still active Catholic cathedral where tourists wander up and down the aisles eyeing the statues and architecture, but are respectful and quiet during mass or other religious services. Excellent restaurants abound. Finding an outstanding restaurant in the Square with spectacular French and Creole cuisine was not a surprise. Finding one named Muriel’s was. And finding Muriel’s had a fascinating ghost in residence, complete with his story, as well as an upstairs outdoor balcony for sipping cocktails overlooking the excitement below made it irresistible. According to local lore, a wealthy man named Pierre Antoine Lepardi bought the property in the 1800s and refurbished the 18th century house to its original grandeur, loving not only the work it involved but the house itself. Pierre also had a thirst for gambling and lost the house in a poker game in 1814. So distraught was he over the loss, the story goes, he committed suicide on the second floor in what is now Muriel’s Séance Room. The room is elegant, rich in colorful fabrics, period furnishings and magnificent large framed paintings. But as much as I sat on the settee quietly in the eerily lit room and listened, inviting company and willing to take my chances on whether he would be friendly, I never heard a peep or got a glimpse of Monsieur Lepardi. The view from the balcony was sheer fun; the later dinner in the downstairs dining room, however, was spectacular. There’s a lot to be said for sampling Bouillabaisse, a combination of shrimp, mussels, crab meat, seafood meatballs and andouille sausage served in a sweet vermouth tomato broth, or shrimp and grits, seasoned with leeks and smoked tomato butter sauce and garlic. Finish it with a Gorgonzola cheesecake with honeyed pecans and slices of tart green apple and you find Muriel’s is as gourmet as it is mysterious. Even better. When the hostess, who runs a very tight, well-organized but very friendly staff, learns a real life Muriel is a dining guest, she presents her with a special labeled bottle of Muriel’s hot sauce. A great souvenir of a magnificent trip south

Whoever said the joy of the journey is in the journey itself must have taken the Auto Train. It’s the only way you can get from the Northeast to Florida on a tank of gas. The Auto-Train, the only one of its kind in the world, at three-quarters of a mile long, the longest passenger train in the world, and the most relaxing way to get between the north east and the Sunshine State, is the non-stop ride that takes you and your vehicle, be it sedan, motorcycle, or SUV, from Lorton, Va. to Sanford, Florida. From there, you’re on your own to points further north or south. But a ride on the Auto-Train means beginning the vacation as soon as you step into the designed especially for the Auto-Train station in Lorton. You check your vehicle at the door, take a carry-on bag of essentials for overnight, and begin to relax. Your vehicle is taken by trained crew members and driven into the two-level enclosed rail cars where, along with the other up to 330 cars making the same trip, it is secured in place for the journey south. At the same time, you’re welcomed into the passenger cars, and depending on whether you opt for a lounge seat or a Superliner Deluxe bedroom, or something in-between, settle into your assigned quarters. It’s the same for the trip north to Lorton, where the station is located immediately adjacent to I-95.. Trains in both directions leave their respective stations at 4 in the afternoon, scheduled to arrive at their destinations 17 hours, 30 minutes later at 9:30 the following morning. You’re requested to arrive at least 60 minutes in advance of departure time, and it takes about an hour on average for all the vehicles to be unloaded and get you on your way at the opposite end. IN between, there are lounge and dining cars, regardless of whether you opt for a seat or a bedroom, movies in the evening, practically always a wine tasting at departure, and a three course dinner complete with wine, all included in the price of the ticket. For those who opt for lounge seats, it means stretching out in the recliner and using the blanket and pillow they provide, or, if you want the extra baggage, carry on your own. Bathrooms are located on the lower level of each car, and fresh fruit, coffee and cookies are generally provided in the lounge car. A full bar is also accessible. Dinner menu offers a choice of five dishes, always including a vegetarian, chicken, beef, and fish entree, with a chef’s special. For those who opt for the Superliner bedrooms, coffee is always available in each car, the deluxe rooms are made for two, have private bathrooms with a mini-shower built in, and the five dinner entrees in the Superliner passenger dining room often include filet mignon along with gourmet chicken dishes. There’s still fresh fruit and cookies in the lounge car. The roomettes are built for two, snug and without a private bath, but providing privacy and comfort. There are also family bedrooms, which sleep two adults and two children in one room, and accessible bedrooms which accommodate two adults and are on the lower level, available on every train. Besides the comfort of travel, there’s the beauty of the passing scenery. Before the sun sets heading north, you’ll leave Florida, pass through Georgia’s oldest city, Savannah, and if everything’s on time, cross the state line into South Carolina. Just before dark, then whiz through Charleston and Florence, SC, as well as the home of the 82nd Airborne at Ft. Bragg, NC. If you’re a light sleeper, you’ll know the train stops for a half hour or so at Florence, SC for a change of engine crew, fueling and watering. If you’re an early riser, the charm of Virginia, from Petersburg, where a famous battle of the Civil War was waged, to Quantico, the home of the US Marine Corps and an FBI training facility, are worth seeing from the large train windows. The railroad runs right smack dab down the middle of several communities, including Ashland, so the slower speed gives you ample time to admire the gracious old Victorian mansions, the busy main street, and picturesque Randolph-Macon College. As spectacular as the scenery is, it’s the folks you meet traveling by train that set this mode of transportation above all the rest. Dining room tables are all set for four, so you’re bound to sit with other interesting people. It’s always fascinating to see where they’re from, where they’re heading and what they like best about rail travel. Surprisingly, there are a plethora of college kids who opt for Amtrak, some because they are afraid to fly, others because it’s an easy way to get all their stuff, crammed into their cars, between home and campus. If there is a major disadvantage to the Auto-Train it’s the fact it travels over rails owned by CSX railroad, which means freight frequently has the right-of-way and the Auto-Train is put on a siding to give access to CSX equipment. This occasionally means delays at arrival; on the occasions late arrivals are four hours late or more, the ingenious kitchen crew aboard whips up lunch for all. Cost of the Auto-Train sounds expensive on the surface, but considering it includes dinner and breakfast, that wine tasting and wine with dinner, the constant coffee and fruit and muffins, and comfortable sleeping accommodations, it isn’t too bad. Add to that the high cost of fuel, particularly if you’re traveling alone, and it could even represent a bargain. Like the airlines, prices vary according to the time of year and the availability; generally, the earlier you reserve, the cheaper you’ll get it. Amtrak often offers a special, sometimes allowing kids to travel free with adults. Any way you look at it, it’s worth a call to 1-800-USA-RAIL to learn more about a Vacation to a Vacation.