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Wanderung 13

Any Which Way But Loose:

Meandering Many Miles in Multitudinous Mechanisms

September 2006

Epilog.

What did we learn on Wanderung 13? Well, for one thing it is possible to cross the U.S.A. from East to West and from North to South using Amtrak rather than commercial airliners. First class travel on Amtrak is not much more than couch class travel on commercial airlines, and is in some ways much more pleasant. As my sister Lois remarked, "All the Amtrak people want us to be there", which is a far cry from the inconvenient, suspicious, degrading, and occasionally hostile and threatening check in procedure at big U.S. airports combined with the cattle-car atmosphere of commercial airliners. We never went through a metal detector on our trip from Washington, D.C. to Seattle, Washington, and I so much enjoyed being able to keep my shoes on my feet and my Swiss Army Knife on my key chain in my pocket rather than stowing it in our baggage or having it confiscated. The human dignity aspect is an intangible, but air travel more and more seems to require that we sacrifice human dignity for security.

Traveling by Amtrak takes longer, of course; it took us a total of four days to travel from Washington, D.C. to Seattle, Washington, whereas the total airline travel time would be about a day all together. But this extra time does not really cost more since you sleep on the train and three very nice meals per day are included in first class "roomette" travel. A bonus of these relaxed diner meals even for introverts like us is that you get to chat with some of your fellow passengers. It all comes down to whether you just want to get from Point A to Point B as quickly as possible (take the plane!) as opposed to really seeing the country (take the train!). The slower, more human scale pace of Amtrak travel lets you actually see the countryside you are traveling through. We enjoyed every minute of it and only regretted that we were traveling through some interesting countryside at night that we could not enjoy.

The only downside to traveling by Amtrak from our point of view was the difficulty sleeping on the train where the rail bed was rough. Actually, most of the time it was so rough that Monika and I even had trouble keeping our balance while walking along the aisle in our railroad car. Unlike Europe where the governments own and maintain the rail beds, rail network in the U.S. is maintained at a minimal level by the rail freight companies. Freight doesn't care how much it is jostled around, but for us poor humans riding Amtrak the rough, uneven rail beds can prevent a good night's sleep; at least it did for me.

It is also a pity, I think, that our rail system has also been allowed to degenerate to the extent that many of the main lines are now single track instead of the old double-track routes, saving money on maintenance no doubt but inevitably leading to congestion when problems occur. Unlike the Good Old Days when passenger trains were given priority, the freight rail companies now give priority to the freight trains with the result that passenger trains can be delayed for hours, sitting on sidings and waiting for freight trains to slowly rumble by. The poor rail beds also prevent most passenger trains from being able to speed up and catch up on their schedules since they are effectively limited to speeds of 80 miles per hour or less, and in some areas much less.

None of that will change unless we, the people, decide that we really want to have a good intercity rail network and are willing to spend some tax dollars to improve the rail beds. However, the political reality is that Amtrak already has to fight for its existence on a yearly basis by requesting subsidies from Congress that are, compared to highway maintenance costs and air transportation system maintenance costs, quite small. We took to the rails in Wanderung 13 partly because I wasn't sure how long Amtrak will survive, and I would recommend that any of you who wish to travel by Amtrak should do so in the near future before it all vanishes. Since rail travel is by far more energy efficient than traveling either by aircraft or automobile, it will almost certainly increase our dependence on foreign oil when Amtrak finally fails, but politically no one seems to care about that either. Oh well.

The cruise up the Inside Passage of Alaska was just great. Floating along in our 5-star hotel watching some of the world's most stupendous scenery drift by while we ate gourmet meals in a fancy dining room just can't be beat as a relaxed way to see the world. We watched humpback whales and orcas feed, sea otters and harbor seals play, and porpoises frolicking in the ship's bow wave. Above it all soared the birds and in the background the clouds shadowed the coastal mountains that were never too far away. I'm not sure how to define "paradise", but surely this type of luxurious travel in a ravishingly beautiful countryside must come close.

Part of the pleasure of our cruise was being together with my family, and that surely made it more pleasurable. Monika and I had an equally wonderful time when we cruised around Italy with her two sisters and their husbands in Wanderung 10, so having family members around seems to be important, at least for us. Bill, Phyllis, Lois and we all have diverse interests, of course, but the cruise ship gave us the latitude to "do our own thing" during the day. However, we made it a point to all get together for dinner in the formal dining room and talk each evening, which was fun and kept us connected.

The Inside Passage is mostly sheltered water and we only felt the ship move for a couple of hours when we were on the high seas and had gale force winds. Otherwise, the ship felt absolutely stable to us, but I should add that neither of us has any tendencies to have motion sickness so we are probably not the best test of that. The ship's motion was mostly a very small, gentle and regular rocking from side to side, which was very different from the jerky and unpredictable motion of the train. I found it quite easy to sleep on the ship, which was in contrast to my repeated problems sleeping on the train. Cruise ship travel is expensive, of course, but when you consider the meals and hotel accommodations that are provided by the ship plus the exotic sights and ports of call, it can be a pretty good deal for the money.

Finally, spending a week bumming around with an old friend is a treasure that is perhaps rarer than it ought to be in today's hustle bustle world. The old adage says something to the effect that "New friends are like silver, old friends are like gold.", and I can certainly see the truth in that. We crashed on Chris's doorstep rather tired and sleep deprived after our trip down the coast, and he not only let us rest and recover for a couple of days but also acted as our chauffeur and tour guide after that. We saw aspects of California that we had never seen before, and much of it was quite magnificent. But in some ways the best part of visiting California was driving his old Cressida along scenic highways while we three had an ongoing discussion of pretty much every topic under the sun. You can really only do that with old friends because you aren't trying to impress them and you don't have to worry about offending them by raising some thorny political, religious, or personal topic. Having all conceivable topics "on the table", so to speak, makes for a far ranging, if unpredictable, conversation and that adds spice to any trip in my book.

Our trip back from Reno, Nevada, on Delta was quick and smooth, but all we had in the airplanes for a full day of travel was three snacks. Fortunately we supplemented that with a chicken sandwich in the Atlanta airport to help tide us over. My comfort was much improved on the version of the Boeing 757 with the increased legroom, but sleeping in coach class in any airplane+ would still be well nigh impossible for me, despite it being smoother than the train, because I cannot stretch out. Fortunately we could fly home during the daytime; we arrived on time at both Atlanta and Baltimore Washington airports and could sleep in our own bed that very same night. It was fast and efficient, but in some ways we missed the lumbering, quixotic travel by train or the smooth, luxurious travel by ocean liner. Still, all good things must end and we had wonderful pictures and memories of our travels on Wanderung 13 to take home with us.

Copyright 2006 by R. W. Holt and E. M. Holt
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