Bwyty Wide Choo Choo Fain, Again?

That's what we've heard every day since we went on the Amtrak ride, so if you judge success on the urgings of 2 year olds, the train ride was very successful, and by most accounts, it was.  Being that I'd informed you all of our plans to take B on his first choo choo experience, I figured I'd better blog about it before I forgot about it!

This little (you'll hear more about that later) trip has been on my mind for over a year.  As a matter of fact, I blogged last May about my blow money ($50) and about how I was going to spend that in the month of May 2010.  One of the things listed was a train ride with my hubs and B.  (It is very inexpensive just to get the experience of a train ride!)  So a year later I decided to stop putting it on my list of things to do and book it already!

That I did.  For Aaron, myself and B, it cost us $6.25 total to take the train from our town to the nearest town with an Amtrak station, a town about a 30 minute drive away.  Since we live in ruralville, USA, only two trains go through a day, so riding down and back meant you have to blow about 8 hours... and that seemed impractical and boring.  So, we packed the car up in the morning, drove one car to this nearby town, dropped it off, packed in the other family car, had lunch, and came home.

(I bet you can't guess where we ate! :)

We dropped Ans Mak at Gaga's and went straight to the train station.  Now, before I proceed, I must say that this was a first train ride for all three of us, and we're new to all of life in the Amtrak world.  So we stood in our little train station, rather, sat and drummed on chairs, until several minutes after our train was supposed to arrive (12:51 p.m.).  Finally, Aaron noticed a number listed on a bulletin board to check the status of such train (remember, our train station is a building with an unlocked door, no attendant, nothing... a little creepy actually).  After calling, we found out that, ultimately, our train was late, and was late by about 3 hours.  Ouch.

B waiting in the train station, before we found out that we were 3 hours early! 


Luckily, we're flexible in this household, and we brought B home to nap, Gaga kept Ans Mak, and at about ten minutes to what was expected to be our trains new departure (we checked several times), we headed back up to the train station stop.

Within minutes our train was waiting and we were loading.  B sat on my lap as we found our seats, the gentleman who gave us our tickets did so and explained the train to us.  B and Aaron decided to go check stuff out:  the other cars, the dining car, etc., and seemed to really enjoy it.   We really believe it'd be a very neat way to travel!  It was a much smoother and less noisy ride than I expected!  Fun was had by all, even three hours after the fact!  We plan to do it again soon, and I'd suggest it to any family with children as a fun day trip! 

 B and Momma sitting by the window, checking out the scenery.

 B and daddy coming back from the dining car.

So if you haven't been on an Amtrak ride, I really would recommend it.  My number one recommendation if you do it, though:  Make sure you check the status of your train!

-A