Day 9

September 16, 2012

Well, every trip ends, and this trip ended badly.

I lay in bed till about 9 or so.

I called in and did my bounce back offer for next year. Going from Sunday to Saturday, quick svc dining for free, and paid extra to be upgraded to basic dining. I have 6 months to worry about any more upgrades. I won’t even think about anything to February, 2013. The last couple of years I go from Saturday to the following Sunday.

Then I started to pack. I stopped backing to return the scooter about 9:30 or so. On the way back from dropping off the scooter, I looked around the food court. It was still hectic, So I went back to the room to finished packing.

I left the room for the last time about 10:45. Checkout was 11. So I headed to the food court, got a bounty breakfast and used up my last two snack items on OJ and a red PowerAde. I ate a little. I did leave with 4 meal credits left. Just didn’t feel like getting anything else.

Since I have been going yearly, I hated the Orange Juice selection, Minute Maid with some pulp. I am ok with Minute Maid, but I have a problem with eating while drinking, translation, no pulp. This year they have new OJ, Simply Orange, pulp free. I only realized it about 1/2 way into my trip. I used 4 or 5 snack options on OJ. It was nice that all the rooms had frigs now.

My car service driver called me as I was finish eating, so I went to the pick up area and he drove me without incident to the train station. Bob from Sunray was engaged else where, so one of his drivers drove me.

At the station, I am trying to find things to do to waste time. Watch TV, only getting one station, nothing interesting. Watching DVD, little bored. Someone walks up to me.. and goes Are you Bruce? Her name was Penny, met her in the Sunday night Amtrak chat room. She lives near here, and remembered the day I was leaving and decided to meet me. She just looked for someone in the Yankee hat. J I mentioned that I was sick and she took a step back J Told her I was over it anyway. We spoke for a couple of minutes and she left.

The south bound Amtrak train to Miami was running late, and since Amtrak uses one track for both directions, I had to wait till the southbound to clear the tracks before my northbound to New York could proceed. We pulled out of Orlando about 2:20 pm, We were supposed to leave about 1:35. Being an hour late isn’t a big deal, since north of Washington, DC, we just discharge passengers, no pick ups, so we always made time up there.

I still have very little appetite, so I skipped lunch on the train, will see how I feel like for dinner.

I hopefully will have a uneventful trip. I plan on doing allot of sleeping.

I am home now, been home for hours already, been sleeping mostly.

From the trains first movement with me on board, till final stop at NY Penn, it was 21 hrs, 33 minutes.

I did skip lunch on board, but had dinner at 6:30. This was a reconditioned dining car, which is a little more comfy then the unrecondtioned one.

Since the Silver Meteor had a couple more sleeper cars then the Silver Star, this dining car was a little more packed, so no eating solo. I was seated at a table with 3 others. Two did most of the talking, so I just ate and looked out the window. I then went back to my room.

The bedroom is of course nicer then the roomette. Hopefully somehow I can afford a bedroom next year.

I continued to watch The Big Valley. Its been long since I watched the series so I didn’t remember what comes next.

Sunday nights, there is an online chat room for Amtrak fans, so I also chatted in the room for a bit while I had reception for my mifi device. I logged out of the chat room about 9:30.

I chatted with a few friends online, then tried to sleep, which I did on and off. I watched on my GPS as we left Florida for Georgia to South Carolina, to North Carolina.

I had breakfast on board, again, sat with a couple of others, but just ate and went back to my room around 7 am. I tried to lay down, but couldn’t fall asleep. So I just continued to watch the dvd player and watched the states go by on the GPS.

Except for the delay at the start of the trip, we seemed to make good time up to New York.

We made it into Penn about an hour late, around noon. I left the train, entered back into Manhattan street life. I walked a block to the Subway, took the subway back to Brooklyn home. Met my mother, got my mail, took my luggage upstairs, and went to sleep for the rest of the afternoon. Still haven’t unpacked, I still have my not so scary candy in the luggage, but in a sealed zip lock bag, so no worries.

That’s all folks ;) See you next year.