Vacation #2: Getting there

an intenet photo of the train that runs through Springfield, Massachusettes

On the night before we left, the kids and grandparents came over for pizza and farewells.  Youth sponsors also showed up to pray for Tim.  People left around 10pm. 

As usual, my day had not gone quite as planned.  The house was ready, the laundry was ready, but I was not packed.  However, our 2:45am train was late, so I got to sleep 2 hours instead of just 1.

At the train station we waited until 4:30am before boarding.  That was when we were told we could not take the Bolivia box.  Chuck hurriedly carried the box into the station and made arrangements with the ticket master to keep it safe until someone could pick it up.  Then we woke Ben and Andrea to ask one of them to get it before 8am, when the station closed for the day.

After we had slept for a while, I checked out the luggage compartment more closely.  It was packed full of small bags that could easily fit in overhead storage on the seating section of the train.  When I went bag up to the seating section, I was frustrated to find that the overhead storage was nearly empty.  The box could have easily gone with us to Chicago.

But since that was no longer an option, we needed to readjust.  We canceled the arrangements we had made for an acquaintance in Chicago to pick up the box, and found an acquaintance in Newton who would be going to Chicago who would be willing to transport the box.  This took a multiple phone calls but thank God for cell phones.  I don't know what we would have done if we had not had those available.

Incidentally, this conductor seemed a bit grouchy about other things that day.  We were on a train full of boy scouts on their way home from a summer of backpacking.  In the observation car Chuck overheard the conductor talk with one of them about how clean the observation car was before the boy scouts got on, and how dirty it was after just a few hours.

An hour later, he got onto the train announcement system and welcomed the boy scouts to the train.  Then he proceeded to let everyone on the train know how clean the observation car was before the boy scouts got on, and how dirty it was just a few hours later.

We arrived in Chicago at around 6pm instead of 3pm, but that was OK.  We weren't planning to meet Hannah for supper until around 7.  We left a message on her phone and then enjoyed sitting outside at Union Station in Chicago.  One side of the station faces a river and beyond the river, the Hancock building.  There were tour boats going up and down the river.  On the corner a saxophonist was playing familiar songs.  The weather was great.

Hannah met us on the street side of Union Station and we took our bags with us about 8 blocks to the Greek part of Chicago.  There we found a Greek fast food restaurant with gyros---very large gyros.  We had a great visit with Hannah talking as fast as we possibly could and made it back to the train station by about 8-8:30pm to board our train east.

There we met the conductor from hell.  OK, maybe not that bad, but she reminded me of descriptions of torture where the torturer pretends to be your friend and then screams at you and then pretends to be your friend again.  That was this woman.

She did not show you where to sit.  She yelled at you as though you should have known before she told you.  Then she would come by and strike up a friendly conversation.  Then she would look down and see the strap of your backpack two inched into the aisle.  "GET THAT STRAP OUT OF THE AISLE!!!"  It was unnerving.  This continued throughout the entire ride.

When we stopped for a stretch break I asked if I could walk a bit to stretch my legs.  "No!" she exclaimed in an offended tone.  A minute later she came to me and told me I could walk between the door of our car and a nearby stairwell.  I paused.  "Well, start walking!"  She yelled.  I laughed and scooted out of there.

When we were near our destination she warned those of us getting off that we needed to collect our bags.  Tim stood up to put on his sweatshirt.  She hollered, "Sit down! We aren't even across the river yet!"  "What river?", we wondered. Were we supposed to know that there was a river before we came to our stop?

We were glad to say goodbye to her and hello to Becca!

On this train, Tim was seated next to a young woman who was wearing a Smith sweatshirt.  She introduced herself as Elora.  I asked if it was like the movie.  She seemed happy to find someone who knew about Elora Dannon from the movie "Willow".  She was named for that baby.  Her last name wasn't Dannon, but it was very similar.  She and Tim got to talking about music and I think she gave him 8G of music from her mp3 player.

Because our train was several hours late, Becca was already late for her bedtime (she gets to work at 3:30am).  We grabbed McD's to go and headed for White River Junction, making our plans for the next day's activities on the way.