The Empire Builder To The Coast And Back

 

ARTS at King Street Station is a great way to spend time waiting for the train in Seattle.

This is the second time we rode the Amtrak Empire Builder this year. The last time was in July from Seattle to Williston, North Dakota as the last leg of our around the world journey. Sleeping our way home in a tiny Roomette sleeping car was the perfect way to adjust to the time difference between Japan and the Central Time Zone. As our first time in Seattle, it was a pity we basically went from the plane to the local train and then on the Amtrak without seeing much of the city. King Street Station actually has a wonderful ARTS at King Street Station gallery upstairs that was featuring local graffiti artists in an exhibition.

Our train heading west from Williston featured the new super-efficient, Siemens Charger locomotives pulling the 50-year-old original carriages. Updated in 1995, but showing wear, it would be good to see money spent to upgrade them. It was nice to see the station platform upgrades of fence, lights and concrete thanks to the Inflation Reduction Act. Hopefully more funding will allow for upgraded carriages. It will be nice to see how much more efficient these new locomotives are than the old GE Genesis.

This trip, we boarded to travel to Portland, Oregon to visit family for Christmas. I still haven't mastered sleeping on the train, but each time it gets better. As I've written before, flying out of North Dakota in addition to being not fun and hard on the climate is expensive. Most of the journey is at night, so when one figures the time, the daytime hours spent aren't that much more than flying. 

It was very cool to see the new clock funded by the Inflation Reduction Act. Along the route, I saw similar improvements in every small town station, a great use of taxpayer dollars.

The night train concept is one that I learned in Europe as a way to both have a place to stay and get from one place to another (two for one). It is growing in popularity in Europe again due to concerns about the climate cost of short distance flights. A few times we have taken a seat for the 12-hour journey to Minneapolis from Williston, a much better way than driving and almost as inexpensive. I sleep ok in the large seats, and it beats driving, especially in winter. For the 25-hour journey to Portland, we chose a small roomette, though we have done it in a seat a few times. I hope the night train concept catches one so one can travel on more lines than just the Empire Builder. The climate benefits of train travel beat driving in most cases and flying by a wide margin unless it is super long distance.

 

The narrow hallway between rooms, that while still comfortable, show the wear of thirty years.

On the trip out and back I read one book and a second during our time in Oregon. We ate four meals, this time in our room instead of the dining car. I like to eat in the dining car because of the interesting conversations meeting people you are randomly seated with, but it was a nice change. This time too, I didn't venture down to the observation car where it is also easy to get into conversation. There isn't much to see quite literally traveling on the day of the winter solstice.

 

Going west it was dark before we could see anything, and we woke to the Columbia Gorge. On the way back, we woke to first light in Glacier National Park, a great sight that never gets old. Still, there is something meditative and compelling about the endless hours of prairie that stretch out from Glacier all the way home. Staring out the window is a sort of meditation on space and time.

The sun rose over Glacier and set while we were still hours from Williston. Montana is massive.

The sun setting near Glasgow, Montana, still a few hours from Williston.

While we boarded about two hours late, the train made up the time and we arrived about noon the next day at Portland Union Station. Union Station is the type of classic old space that fortunately has been preserved. As a roomette passenger, we also had access to the lounge (below) with free coffee, drinks and snacks. Try to find that in any airport.