Off To The Underground Tour

I had spent the earlier part of the day by taking the ferry to Bremerton and then visiting the aquarium at the pier. I am tired and catch a few hours of rest before taking off for the night time activities. I want to take the much talked about 8:00 pm adult underground tour at pioneer square. I leave the B&B after six, walking down the 30 slippery stairs in the front of the house and start down the long hill on Madison towards the city. I want to stop off at BofA to pickup some more cash. I walk about 15 minutes and after a successful retrieval of cash at BofA stop to grab a cup of coffee at Starbucks. It is raining as it has been since Wednesday at noon and it is time for something hot to drink.

I must wait in line for a few minutes. There are about 5 people in front of me. I order my coffee and I do a preemptive strike and offer my name for the cup. The tall girl at the counter then smiles with a little smirk and says "Nice to meet you Alan, my name is Julie. You know Alan, [pause] we are a small store and i really do not need your name; but for you i will put it on the cup." she writes "a-l-l-e-n" on the cup and then says as an afterthought "did i spell it right?". I tell her "no, it is a-l-a-n". She is smiling that "we are having fun now smile" and passes the cup off to the right.

I miss the route 12 bus so i opt to try out route 11. It looks like the route 11 bus is a better fit because it goes to pioneer square where the tour will start. I should get there early enough to get something to eat; perhaps at the Thai restaurant i ate at a few days earlier. The bus ride town town is uneventful and we are getting close to pioneer square. It looks like another block and i will exit the bus for a perfect landing. Suddenly, the bus driver takes the entrance to the highway that passes over the pier area downtown. I about die when I see his move. This is an unwelcome event that could delay my timely arrival at the underground tour. I quickly check my iphone for a map of route 11 and see that yes indeed there is another bus stop showing down the road. Relax dude. We travel for about 10 minutes on the highway crossing bridges and at about 7:15 pm we arrive at the last stop. I anticipate that the bus will now return to the city and continue back to pioneer square. Unfortunately, the bus continues in a South Westerly direction entering a residential neighborhood. That is cool, because the bus must go back to pioneer square at some point. I still have time to make the tour if the bus turns around soon. Right?

A half hour passes and the bus is still heading in a southbound direction passing from the nice neighborhoods of the coast into run down neighborhoods on the inland. Originally a full bus back at the city it is now down to just me and some guy that blasts music from an iphone. he leaves the bus, but not before getting an earful from the bus driver about rules on music on a bus. It is time for me to fess up to the driver, admit my crime and find out what my options are. i move to the front of the bus and tell the driver that i missed my stop. He asks me which stop and I tell him downtown. He says "say what? downtown. that was like 45 minutes ago". I tell him I am just a stupid tourist. What more can i say?

The bus driver is a nice guy and asks me where I am from and we talk about the weather. At this point it is after 8:00 pm and my hopes of going to the underground tour are very much smashed against the shores of the sound like a boat caught in storm. I ask the driver "when are we going back to the city?". He says "not anytime soon. I will be going on break soon. But, you get off at the next stop and take the 120 route on the other side of the street and that turns into the 11 and you will be back to where you came from in no time." Mystery solved; Route 11 turns into another route downtown. That is how i ended up here in Southwest Seattle. Would have been good to know ahead of time.

I get off at the next stop. Like, what choice do I have? Not a bad place but not a good place either. I stand in the bus shelter for a few minutes to get out of the rain with the other riders and survey the landscape. A black guy in his teens comes up and asks me where the bus goes. I tell him that I really do not know. With my luck tonight I do not want to mislead him. He could end up in Portland with my information. I hear him on his cell phone call someone and in a pissed off tone tell them "Yea, the %&^%^$# robbed me and then they dropped me off in the West side with no money." I start to slide away from him at the stop all the while checking the other denizens of the bus stop for other potential threats to my person.

Back across the road are real Mexican and Vietnamese restaurants. Not tourist restaurants but the real deals from real working folk. I check my iphone for the schedule on route 120. The bus will not be here for another 35 minutes. I am hungry and the badlands restaurants are looking better by the minute. I really do not want to eat here but I am getting desperate and my tummy is talking. I cross the road and start to peer into the Vietnamese restaurant when I see a bus coming down the road. It says up top that it is the 23 that goes to downtown and Broadway. I make a quick executive decision and jump the bus just as it is getting ready to pull away. Better to take something that is going somewhat my way than stand around and get shot.

After a lengthy drive back North on the back roads route I get lucky and the bus really does go to downtown Seattle. I jump off in the Pike market area around 9:00 pm. Really hungry now, I see a bar/restaurant that is open. Not many restaurant options this time of the night in downtown Seattle. I decide to take a seat at the bar and start my order with a NA beer. The bar tender delivers the bottle and and I ask for a glass as always. After I get my glass I start to sip the beer and hear the strangest sounds emulating from a guy two seats over. Sounds something like a cross between Sylvester the cat and the mad hatter. As I take a peek across the empty seat between the two of us I find that I am looking eye ball to eye ball with a certified class "A" bum. What the heck is going on here? My man is dressed in the classic dirty green jacket with long matted dirty greasy hair and missing teeth.

Unfortunately, due to the peculiar circumstances of the bar I make the classic rookie mistake of making eye contact with a bum. He is sitting in front of an empty mixed drink, hissing and spitting through his missing teeth and repeatedly throwing down 10 and 20 dollar bills and then picking them up again. What is he doing here? What is he doing with the bills? Why would the bar tender let him stay? Why me? The bum is now staring at me. I am feeling trapped. After what felt like days the bar tender comes over and says to him "no, you are not getting any more to drink. you have had enough.". the bum says something, but I am clueless as to what he says because it just sounds like spitting through a straw.

People in the bar are now all looking and staring at the bum. There is a white guy and a black girl quietly sitting in a high stool table about 5 feet behind us having a nice conversation. Suddenly, the bum flips around in his seat and starts screaming violently directly at the black girl. His roar is terrible and I am feeling for the couple as they are forced to endure the tirade. The bum then marches out of the bar all the while screaming something unintelligibly and violently waving his arms. The bum passes by the front window along a row of outdoor bar tables and dashes off down the street. There is a long serious silent pause in the bar as everyone tries to take in what just happened. Suddenly, the black girl jumps to her feet and points at the bar tender and yells at the top of her lungs "I WANT WANT HE HAD TO DRINK!". The bar roars with laughter as she stands smiling from ear to ear in the middle of the bar room floor with her hands on her hips.

I finish getting something to eat at the bar and then decide to head on back to the B&B. What a night this has been and I am really getting very tired. My favorite route 11 is the closest exit back so I check my faithful iphone for the nearest bus stop. The stop is on Pike and Third street, but the bus is not going to be there for another 35 minutes. It is raining as always but now it is coming down even harder. I arrive at the stop and there is a building overhang where about 25 people are waiting for about 10 different routes. I lean back against the building and relax.

A guy standing next to me smoking a cigarette, dressed in an all black ankle length coat with white tennis shoes and looking very Johnny Cash like says in a Southern Drawl "there appears to be a severe shortage of cigarettes here in town. I could sit down with a box of cigarettes and make a fortune by selling them one by one.". He has got these big dark eyes and looks at me with a slightly twitched look of someone that is running away from something or someone. Since i am going to be with him a bit i ask him where he is from. He says that he is from Mobile and Dallas. Just then a guy and girl are walking by. The girl comes right over to me, bends down and takes what looks to be a very small cigarette stub from between my feet and the wall and says to her friend "a good one!". She then marches on down the street with her buddy and a new happy face.

Johnny in his Southern Drawl whistles and says "She has got some good eyes! She spotted that joint from 10 feet away". Just then a bum stops in front of Johnny and says "can you spare a cigarette?". Johnny say "no, but I can sell you one". This is not what the bum wants to hear. Johnny feels for him and gives him the half smoked butt that he is working on. The bum moves on and Johnny says "some times you just got to throw them a bone". Within seconds a girl and a guy that can best be described as sleep walking stops in front of Johnny. The girl literally holding the guy up says "can you spare a cigarette?". Johnny, turns to me with that big "told you so" grin. The girl says "my boy friend just had surgery and I am taking him home. I just had to go into the men's room to find him. He fell asleep on the toilet. Some guy came in and wanted to know what we were up to." Keep in mind that we are standing in downtown Seattle at 9:30 PM in pouring rain. What are these people doing coming out of surgery here and now? The guy has long blond wispy shoulder length hair with a slim figure and blue jeans that are barely staying on. He is slowly sliding downwards like the scarecrow on the yellow brick road in the wizard of OZ. With a blank expression and his eyes completely closed he pulls up his shirt to show a fresh scar down the middle of his belly. I tell the girl "you really need to get this guy off the street and home.".  She grabs his arm and leads the raggedy Andy man off down the street. Johnny says "back home people would get 20 years for what they do here."

There are all kinds of people swirling and mixing at the bus stop in the rain. There is a young couple passionately in love kissing all the time. There is a couple standing and talking.  The flowers  he bought her at pike market passed back and forth between them while they wait. There is a guy dressed in a skeleton suit talking to his drunken buddies. There is a Japanese girl with a yellow umbrella standing at the bus stop sign apparently enthralled with the down pour.  Many buses come and go. The night, rain, light, people all twirl together like a bad dream suddenly realized after you fall out of bed. Finally, Johnnies bus comes and he boards. The last I see Johnny,  he is silently looking back at me with a forlorn look through the dripping window of the bus as it pulls away from the stop.

My bus arrives and I am ready to go. I jump on and park myself about half way back in the bus. Just as the bus is pulling away from the curve a guy that is sitting in the front row holds up a cell phone and screams out "hey, who's cell phone is this?". The girl in the next row then yells back "it belongs to that bike rider guy that just got off". Everyone is peering out the rain soaked windows for the guy with the bike. "there he is" screams yet another rider on the left side of the bus.   The biker is now on the other side of the street about a half block up riding on the sidewalk. The bus driver gets with the team and yells "I'll catch him!". The bus driver punches it and we pull up parallel to the biker all the while doing about 25 miles per hour through the down town district.   Close your eyes and envision this: we are in downtown Seattle in a bus at night racing in the rain to get ahead of a bike rider on a sidewalk.  A group of people on the bus are banging on the windows on the left side and yelling "your cell phone, hey your cell phone" through the cold closed moisture laden glass windows.   The biker finally sees the commotion on the bus and comes riding over zigzagging across the on coming  traffic. A guy in the front of the bus jumps off with the phone and runs the wrong way around the bus to find the biker. Finally the two come together on the other side of the bus and biker gets his phone back. The biker very grateful to get his cell phone back then rides off into the night. The couple in love apparently oblivious to the commotion continue to kiss as we ride in the now silent bus back up the hill on Pike and then Madison.

I get off the bus at Madison and 19th sometime after ten, walk the two blocks back to the B&B and quickly fall asleep.  I guess tomorrow I should take the route 12 bus to go to the underground tour.

We Arrive in Seattle

Sunday afternoon and we finally hit the ocean coast and now there are inlets, boats and rugged coastal beauty. Little strings of homes nestled along niches in the coast. We are cruising right on the water at sea level. We pass piers with ships loading people ready to cross to island within walking distance. Onward to Tacoma where industry lives along the shore. The light is becoming low in the sky as I see Mount Rainier in the distance highlighted by the sun and surrounded by a halo of wispy clouds.

I selected the last dinner option at 6:00 pm. I am paired with a retired couple from Northern Wisconsin. This is the second time on the trip that i have been paired with a couple from Northern Wisconsin. I went on to tell them about the other couples experiences. Like the other couple they had come from the Midwest via Amtrak.

My conversation takes an interesting twist when they discover that i am vegetarian. the man tells me he is too. He was diagnosed with Leukemia 3 years ago and decided to stop eating meat and most sweets to stay healthy. He smiles with a really big grin and tells me that his passion is traveling to remote places and then sending his doctor postcards from the location. He tells me that he had 8 chemotherapy sessions and is still going strong. His doctor says that he is a walking miracle and his number one patient. it is impossible to forget his smile.

After dinner i head back to my room to clean up and prepare for the landing. Paul is cleaning a room across the hall and is all excited because we are running hard and fast. He says it is 35 minutes to Seattle. Paul reminds me that he will be going back to Los Angeles in the morning then he will have 6 days off. He is excited because the return trip has been booked full. I am confused with his statement about being full because he told me the same about our trip. Maybe he is referring to the coach seating because my area appeared to be about half full? We are really moving the last miles at what my GPS shows to be 75 miles per hour. Just as the sun is setting we roll past the mariners stadium and into the Amtrak station at about 8:00 pm on Sunday night. Seems fitting coming in at dusk. Just a few people left on my car as we wait at the lower door for the train to stop. Our lunch room server Maurice is there in civilians cloths. My buddy from Vancouver asks him if he likes the 4-6 schedule. He answers “you bet, yes. Especially when you have vacation because it means you have 16 days off”. We stop, I get off and I am the first to hit the taxis. In the distance i see Paul helping elderly ladies down off the train. Amtrak, you need to give Paul the attendant of the year award.

The Ride Across Oregon

It is Sunday morning and I wake and feel the train moving more slowly now. The car is gently swaying back and forth instead of the violent motion of the night before. I open the curtain and the darkness provides a screen of massive evergreen trees just feet from the window. All darkness except for the brief times when the train sways and I can see the with the eyes of the engineer the landscape before and the yellow beams of the headlights. At 5:45 am pinnacles of light appear randomly between the trees. Suddenly I see a order menu from a some unknown fast food chain appear. Then darkness prevails once again and the train meanders up the narrow canyons of total darkness.

The darkness recedes and spikes of the sun's orange flashlight beams pierce the walls of the room. I took a quick shower in the downstairs show only room and then went to breakfast at 7:15 am. I was paired with a couple that was traveling with their family of brother and mother who was in a wheel chair back in the coach. We dined on omelets and scrambled eggs as the wetlands of Oregon started sliding by. We are now pulling into Klamath Falls, Oregon.

After a brief stop in Klamath Falls we pass through forest and fields eventually hugging Klamath upper lake. The lake lasts about 20 minutes with the top of mount hood showing snowy peaks in the distance. I sit in the observation car open to all passengers. Many of the people look tired and dis-shuffled from sitting up all night. After about an hour I move to the parlor car for a change of pace. The parlor car is available for the sleeper car passengers and has different feel to it. The crowd is older and the pace is slower. People sit and have conversations frequently.

I am starting to get into the rhythm of the train. Keep in mind that there are two worlds on the train. There is the coach seating that is a bit like the wild west. The pace is faster and people come and go from seats and cars frequently. The other end of the train is the sleeper car passengers. They tend to be older and more stationary. Sleeper car people stay longer in the cars and enjoy conversations with their friends. There is a world on the train that cuts a swatch through each world the train encounters. We twist and turn through the forest and fields slicing the sunlight with our whistle.

It is 11:24 am and we have been traversing the forests of Oregon on the way to Portland for hours. Most of the time we now see just trees along the side of the route. Just feet from my viewing window. At times we reach a ridge and take in a splendid view but the sight quickly evaporates and we run back to the forests.

I am reading Socialnomics by Erik Qualman. Great book and I can not help wonder if social media could help Amtrak. Most of the passengers in the sleeper cars will have passed on in 20 years. I see few people younger than 50 and the ones I do see are just train junkies. I was excited when I booked the coastal starlight because it lists wireless as a feature and benefit. When I arrived I tried to identify a signal and found none. I then noticed in the literature that wireless is a feature of the parlor car. So, I go to the parlor car and setup but still not signal. I get up the courage and ask the women that runs the car about the WIFI. She says “sure it is running”. I say “I do not think so”. So she takes me down to the movie theater and finds that the WIFI is turned off. She flips it on and says “there you go, but it does not work to good because there are not many cells”. Great, I try the WIFI again and there is a signal this time. We were sitting at the station at San Luis Obisbo so I am thinking that there must be a cell here. I connect and find that there is a communications signal but no internet connectivity. I gave up. This morning she asked me about the internet and I just told her to forget about it.

If Amtrak wants to move into the 21st century then they will need to have great internet connectivity. Not just good connectivity some times, but great connectivity all the time. Kids today that will become the parents of tomorrow will not ride unless they can communicate and text with their friends anytime and anywhere. The clock is ticking. It Amtrak does not move forward then their existing customer base, which does not appear to be that great based upon what I am seeing will continue to diminish to include only train freaks such as myself and a few others.

At Portland we receive a 50 minute reprieve. I exit the train and just walk for blocks in the hot sun not really knowing where i am going. I am just happy to get out and get moving. it must be about 80 degrees and the sun is very intense. We load up after the break and head off across the Oregon. Much is farmland, flat and simple compared to the rugged lands we have crossed.

The Ride Across California

Eleven thirty arrives and it is time for lunch. I go in to the dining car and the man takes my ticket. I am seated with a couple that are going to Vancouver for a few days and then will take the cruise ship back to Los Angeles. They are retired and live in Irvine. They tell me that they are both California natives with the women being a forth generation. She says her grandson loves telling people that he is a 6th generation Californian. They have a pretty good vegetarian menu with many salads, pastas and sandwiches. I go for the vegeburger. Good stuff and then top it off with vanilla ice cream. After lunch then back to the room for our arrival into Santa Barbara. We glide along the edge of the ocean with the clouds hanging low and just gently touching the tips of the hills next to us. I hear the server pointing the clouds out to an associate. The train whistle constantly is blowing as we slide through the coastal neighborhoods of Santa Barbara. Suddenly as we arrive at the station the sun comes out in full brightness. Other than the occasional announcements and the blowing of the room fans, there is silence in my room.

At 2:30 pm we stopped in order to let rail traffic pass. I took the opportunity to move to the Parlor car and check it out. Other than myself there are 3 other people inside the car. A guy I was sitting with at lunch says that each rounded window in the cab costs $7,000. He talked with the maintenance man one time while he was riding. He has ridden this train close to 20 times. He owns a house in Vancouver he purchased 8 years ago. The parlor cab was built in 1956 and is one of the main attractions to the trip.

I spent the remainder of the afternoon in the plush comfort of the parlor cab. At times falling asleep while viewing the rolling dry hills paralleling the 101. I went to an early first dinner at 5:20 PM and sat with a young lady and her 29 month old boy, Adam. They were on their way to Tacoma to visit relatives. Adam specializes in smashing cheese pizza on his face.

After dinner I retired to the observation car where I am typing this blog. The sun is now low in the sky and the we are passing through flat land crops. The sprinklers are going strong and when you look into the direction of the sun you see a sea of fountains holding hands into the far distance. We pass these islands as we traverse the plains toward the North.

People love to wave at trains. I catch glimpses of people here and there in streets, yards, parks and houses all waving passionately. I think that all want to be on the train and leave what they are currently doing behind. While sitting in the parlor I caught sight of a small child waving from a miniature attic window. I doubt that anyone else on this train would have noticed the child and I wondered how many times that child would have waved over the course of weeks and months that had passed. We will be pulling into Salinas in a few minutes.

We stopped at Salinas for a few minutes and then left for San Jose. At San Jose we stopped for about 20 minutes and I got off the train for some air. It really was time to get off and try to forget about the rocking motion. Most of the passengers got off and walked around a bit. I talked to the guy that lives in Vancouver for awhile because he is a fountain of information regarding trains. He says that every Amtrak train employee has stories from the past. He went on to describe a running gun battle that one employee had recited to him from the early 80s.

At 9:00 pm Paul came by the room and turned down the bed. He said that the bottom bed was better because it was less claustrophobic. He had slept on the top bed twice and did not like the feeling. We are now outside of San Jose and the night is pitch black with the exception of a few small lights on the horizon. The train whistle continues to blow. I wonder if it is the engineer just pushing buttons for something to do.

I read for awhile and then turn the lights off. At times the train moves quickly and you have the feeling that you might be thrown from your bed, but all in all the night goes well and you eventually you drift off to sleep.

At Los Angeles Union Station

I left the house at 7:00 am for the Irvine Amtrak station. Sarah Peeler told me the night before that her husband Ryan was to ride the Amtrak century on Saturday morning. I was afraid there would be millions of riders at the station preparing for their journey. I was hoping that the Century ride was not leaving at the same time I was. To my delight they had departed before I arrived. I arrived at the station in plenty of time for my train. The surf liner arrived exactly at 7:46 am. I was off to Union Station.

The ride to Union station really felt short and I noticed that they had painted over all of the graffiti in the river basins as we arrived at the station. If you have never been to union station then you really need to go sometime. The architecture is beautiful and I never get tired of stopping and looking. There is a special room that is off limits to the public and used for movie production. You can look over the rail and check it out.

There was a special area for sleeper car passengers. They check you in and you are offered complimentary beverages. I grabbed a coffee and then was off the bagel shop. At 9:30 am they announced that you could either be taken to the train via a golf cart or walk. I walked to tunnel 10 and up to the train. When I arrived at the train I was directed to the first sleeper car at the front of the train. Good news and bad news. The good news is you are along ways away from people and traffic. The bad news is you are a long way away from everything. Not a big problem but you must walk through about 5 cars to get to the parlor lounge. The parlor lounge is an exclusive car for sleeper car passengers. The parlor car serves a special menu and has a full complement of regional wines. After the parlor car is the dining car where everyone can eat and then the viewing room car. Next comes the observation room in the upper floor with outward facing seats. When you enter a  tunnel it is pitch black through the skyward facing windows.

When I first arrived at the train I left my bag in the room. I was amazed at how small the room was given there is supposed to be 2 bunk beds. I then went out and started a conversation with the car attendant Paul. Not many people were around so we had plenty of time to talk. I asked him about his job and what he sees. Paul works 4 days and then is off 6 days. He only works the coastal starlight and has done for many years. He loves the job and is a real people person. The train left at 10:15 am sharp. I sat in the room for a bit getting acquainted and trying to figure out where everything was. Paul then came by and gave me my complementary sparkling cider. Great stuff. After a bit another attendant came by and gave me my reservation for the dining car. I took the 11:30 am option most familiar to me and my co-workers. I then took off and explored the cars. Paul says this is an excellent time of year to travel. The summer crowd is gone and things slow down. Most of the passengers appear to be older and possibly retired. The pace is very casual, slow and delightful. There is one exception. There is a baby a couple of seats down shaking a rattle like a nut case. We are now at the Simi Valley station. It is really looking hot and dry in the valley.

Pre-Launch Preparation

I am going to ride the Amtrak Coast Starlight from Los Angeles to Seattle this Saturday.  I picked up the printed tickets today from the Irvine Amtrak station just so i would not be surprised at the last minute by a system failure.  Things are coming together.  I have the Bed and Breakfast all reserved in Seattle. I purchased a new rain jacket at REI that was on sale at 50% off with my REI rewards money and a gift certificate from Uncle Keith and Aunt Jan.   I have my suitcase out and i am putting things in as i go.