Issaquah trip report, days 1 and 2

day −1
day 0

2023-02-03 07:00-7:00

I had the scrambled eggs and pork sausage for breakfast.  That was good.

08:58:  we had an emergency brake application due to low air pressure again.  It seems to be a problem with the air hose on the lead engine.  Moving again at 09:20.

10:04:  now 4:30 late departing Grand Forks.

10:11:  emergency application again.  The engineer was complaining about the Siemens engine in the lead (#304).  She said that she seems to have problems with that one every time.

This time the conductor reporting seeing deer remains under the engine.  He guessed that we had hit a deer and that knocked apart the air hoses between the first two units.  We’re now 4:44 late departing Devils Lake.

I had the Angus burger for lunch at noon.  That met expectations.

At Minot, the conductor announced that they we’re now having problems the “the third engine” (that would be the GE #44) which was “making a strange noise”.  It turns out that we’re going to have to set out the third unit.

16:32:  we finally departed Minot with just the two Siemens units, now 6:41 late.  I guess that BNSF’s rule about the Builder having at least three working engine units only applies at departure from the initial terminal…or something.

Sorry for all the geeky stuff so far.  I’ll try to include more about the travel experience later.  This newbie blogger is still getting the hang of it.

Marcus Ranum had mentioned that he’d like to see photos along the way, but I was too discombulated to pack a proper camera.  Imagine vast expanses of pure white snow.

There’s a reason they call North Dakota “big sky country.”  I remember a PA announcement by the café attendant on my first trip on the Builder:  “Ladies and gentlemen, if you look out the train on the right side, you’ll see a house…”  That was the whole announcement. 😎

22:23:  we made the usual fuel stop just east of Havre, Montana, then pulled into the station at 22:44.  Havre is a crew change stop where we get new engineers and conductors who work, not particular trains, but particular sections of track; so there’s usually a long dwell time.  We departed Havre at 22:51, now 6:36 late.

2023-02-04 07:00-8:00

I had the “railroad french toast” with a side of pork sausage for breakfast.  That was quite good.  I guess my first experience with Amtrak’s “new” food service on the western long-distance trains was an outlier; but it’s still not up to the standards that I remember from only about a decade ago.

08:57:  We stayed just under 7 hours late all the way to Spokane, Washington.  This is the first time I’ve seen the Spokane station in daylight since the Builder usually does its work here around midnight westbound and in the wee hours of the morning eastbound.

Spokane is where the train splits into the Seattle and Portland sections.  They set out the Siemens 302 which will eventually pull train 27, the last four cars on the combined train, to Portland, Oregon.  Train 7 now has just the Siemens 304; but it has only five cars to pull, the baggage car, the crew sleeper, the regular sleeper, the diner, and the only coach.

They were able to shorten the usual dwell time in Spokane a bit, and we departed at 09:17, now 5:53 late.

12:00:  they served us lunch in the diner because of the train’s lateness.  I had the Angus burger again.

They still allow only sleeper passengers in the diner, but train 7 between Spokane and Seattle uses the half of the diner nearer the coach as what they call a “mini café” which has a variety of plastic-wrapped stuff that folks can eat.  That’s probably minimally acceptable for breakfast since they’ll have a variety of cereals and breakfast pastries.  I gather that they had only breakfast stuff available for lunch, which is not normally served on this train.

15:43:  we stayed just under six hours late to Everett, Washington, where we head south along Puget Sound.  Since my room is on the fireman’s side, I didn’t get to see much of the Sound; but I got to see all the homes up on the bluff just east of the tracks.  I always marvel at the designs:  lots of balconies, lots of windows, small bits jutting out here and there.  They must be “interesting” to live in.

In Seattle, we enter a long tunnel that eventually discharges the train into King Street Station where we made our final stop at 16:35, just 5:06 late thanks to about half an hour of padding in the schedule.

I’m using a walker this trip because my old back doesn’t want me to remain vertical for more than a few minutes without something to lean on.  It’s one that I bought for my mother years ago; and it has four wheels and a seat to sit on.  I was hoping that the seat would hold my two bags, one with most of the clothes that I’ll need, and a large laptop case with room for another change of clothes; but they didn’t quite fit, at least not in a way that wasn’t awkward, so I checked the larger bag in Chicago.

After claiming my checked bag, I walked half a block to the Embassy Suites where I’ll spend my first night.  Its advantage is proximity to the train station; its disadvantage is that it seems to have been designed by marketeers instead of by hospitality folks.  For example, my room has a very attractive desk where I can work on my laptop, but nowhere nearby to plug it in.  Fortunately, I have my power strip with a nice long extension cord which I used on the train.

After getting my day zero post more or less in order, I went for supper.  I didn’t want a big meal, so I had just the grilled cheese sandwich and tomato soup.  Taking their cue from the hotel, the restaurant gave me a sandwich that was more pretentious than tasty.  The soup was quite good.

After supper, I finished proofreading and posting the day zero post; and that was about all I was good for that day.  I went to bed around 20:00 or so and had a good night’s sleep.

Issaquah trip report, day zero

day minus one

2023-02-02 06:37-6:00

Well, that was a revolting development; and it was totally my fault.  I got up too late because I had forgotten how long it takes
to pack, the result being that I was effectively a newbie who missed the time when they shut down boarding for train 302 by a couple of minutes.

I switched the first leg of my trip to train 22, the Texas Eagle, which, for some reason, is starting out in St. Louis today, so it’ll depart on time.  The bad news is that I’ll have only about an hour and a quarter to make my connection in Chicago. If the train loses time on the way, which can happen just south of Joliet and between Joliet and Chicago, I could miss the Empire Builder as well.  I can still hope for the best, though.

I popped for a roomette on 22, so I’ll be comfortable on the train.

So here I sit in the first class lounge wondering what to do with myself.  They’ll probably start boarding in about 40 minites.

08:03:
We’re pulling only 8 minutes late.

The map and GPS location on the little screen on my cell phone really isn’t very good at all.  I really need to get a new GPS receiver that I can plug into my laptop.

10:00:
They served an early lunch because of the scheduled arrival time in Chicago, but that was fine with me because I had had an early breakfast.  I had the meatballs and baked ziti which I guess could be called food.  I wish they’d restore a proper diner on the Texas Eagle, but the chances of that are probably nill.

We were as close to on time as makes no difference almost all the way into Chicago.  There was a danger of having to wait a while for cross traffic just south of Joliet, but that didn’t happen today.

The Joliet station now has an island platform…that’s new since the last time I was on a train that stopped there.

We’re on Canadian National tracks from Joliet to Chicago, and there’s always the danger of getting stopped there.  We did have some cross traffic to wait for at 13:00, but that lasted only about five minutes.

One thing I noticed is that UP’s trackside detectors don’t go through the whole spiel any more if there’s nothing to report.  CN’s detectors do.

We crossed the bridge onto amtrak property at 13:22 and made our final stop at 13:32.  I’ll definitely make my connection to the Empire Builder.

15:00:
Just five minutes before my next train’s scheduled departure, we were advised that boarding would be delayed one hour due to mechanical issues (I’m guessing the Siemens engines).  We’ll see how long the delay really is.

We started boarding around 16:00.  This train has three engine units, two Siemens Chargers, numbers 302 and 304, and one General Electric Genesis unit, number 44.  The Seattle section has a baggage car, a crew sleeper with several roomettes sold as revenue space, one regular sleeper, a diner, and just one coach.  The Portland section has an accessible coach, a coach-bag, a “cross country café” instead of the usual Sightseer Lounge, and the Portland sleeper.

I’m in room C in the Seattle sleeper, and the bedrooms are on the fireman’s side (the left side of the train), so I’ll have the sun in my eyes and have to close the curtains during parts of the day depending on the time of day and our actual direction of travel at the moment.

We finally got out from under the station at 16:48, so we’re on our way, but METRA and CP/Soo Line are treating us very badly, crossing us over between tracks and giving us lots of stop and restricting signals.

17:43:
We’re already 2:14 minutes late at the first stop of Glenview, IL.

18:05:
We’re stopped again due to “low MR pressure.”  (“MR” is “main reservoir”, an air tank for the brakes.)  That caused an emergency brake application, so the conductor needs to walk the train because such a brake application can cause a derailment…not expected for shorter passenger trains, but they have to make sure.

18:22:
We started moving but almost immediately got another emergency application, and the conductor needed to walk the train again.

18:28:
Moving again.

It’s time for my dinner reservation.  The Empire Builder has a proper diner, and I was looking forward to it.  Unfortunately, I was underwhelmed.  It’s a lot better than the “cross-country café” on the Texas Eagle, but it’s not nearly up to the standards of the diners that Amtrak ran a decade or so ago.

I had the flatiron steak with mashed potatoes and a mix of green and wax beans.  The steak was OK, but everything else was cold by the time I got it.  Also, the beans were cooked in that style where, I guess, the chef lays on hands and intones the magic word, “steam.”  I grew up with what I’ve learned is German style cooking, and I really don’t like tough vegetables.

We didn’t lose any additional time into St. Paul.

As I said here, I’m now in my Seattle hotel and I’m a little wiped out from the trip, so this is about all I can accomplish tonight.  I should be able to get in sync with the reports for days 1 through 3 tomorrow.

Trip Reports Delayed

Planning to do a post every day while on the train turned out to be a bad idea.  I can hardly even type, let alone craft prose that I’d want to read myself, with the train bounding around as it is.  I now hope to be able to produce a report for three days, or maybe three reports, when I get to the hotel in Seattle on Saturday.

Trip Report, day minus 1

I’m headed to a meeting of the C++ standards committee in Issaquah, Washington, a suburb of Seattle.  This will be my first train ride, and my first face-to-face WG21 meeting, since COVID; and I’m looking forward both of them.

Itinerary

I’m allowing an extra day westbound just in case the Builder gets stuck in a snowdrift…or something.  That also gives me a chance to do some touristy things in Seattle where I haven’t been in ages.  I’ll also spend the last night of the return trip at a hotel just three blocks south of Chicago’s Union Station because the Builder often runs late, and there’s the danger of missing the connection to the next train home.

Between Chicago and St. Louis, I’ll take a couple of corridor trains.  Prior to COVID, we had four “Lincoln Service” round trips per day, two of which would run through St. Louis, where they would change their names to “Missouri River Runner”, and continue to Kansas City.  COVID was an excuse for Amtrak to cut service; so we now have just three daily Lincoln Service round trips, and only one Missouri River Runner per day.

The Lincoln Service trains typically have four cars, three coaches and a café car with very comfortable 2-1 business-class seating.  I’ll have biz.-class seats between Chicago and St. Louis which will also get me one complimentary non-alcoholic beverage.

St. Louis is also served by an overnight train, the Texas Eagle, that runs daily between Chicago and San Antonio.  Three days per week, one coach and one sleeper from the Eagle get switched in San Antonio to or from another train called the Sunset Limited that runs between New Orleans and Los Angeles.  I might change my mind and get a roomette on the Eagle for the last leg home.  I’ll decide when I get back to Chicago.

Between Chicago and Seattle, I’ll be riding on the Empire Builder.  Trains 7 and 27 run as a single train to Spokane, Washington, where they split in two, train 7 going to Seattle, and train 27 going to Portland, Oregon.  Trains 8 and 28 recombine in Spokane.  Train 7 turns south around Everett, Washington, and then runs down along the ocean, eventually along Puget Sound, and then into a tunnel that leads to Seattle’s King Street Station.  Train 27 heads down to Pasco, Washington, and then along the northern bank of the Columbia River to Vancouver, Washington, where it crosses the river and heads back east a bit to Portland Union Station.

The Builder uses Superliners as expected.  The Seattle section usually has a baggage car, a crew sleeper, two revenue sleepers, a diner, and two accessible coaches.  The Portland section is typically just four cars long, a Sightseer Lounge, an accessible coach, a coach-bag, and a sleeper.

More detailed timetables for the trains I’ll be taking can be found here and here.

Tomorrow I’ll begin a series of posts about the trip which might read something like a live blog, but won’t be live.  I plan on a single post per day, probably around bedtime.

Great Moments in Broadcasting

KRAB 107.7 FM Seattle - The Doughnut shop

I remember KRAB (FM, Seattle)1 with its programming of Indian classical music, a pipa concert, two hours of Korean temple bells2, things like that, often with European classical music and country blues mixed in.

I remember the old Collins transmitter that sported serial number three, and that we finally had to get a new exciter for since nobody made phasitrons any more.

I remember the antenna up on the telephone pole that you had to go hit with a two-by-four on those rare occasions when the snow started sticking.

And I remember one night when everything, except time, stopped dead.3  What happened was that the accumulated muck and filth in the old converted doughnut shop (sans janitor) had caused the blower that cooled one of the power tubes to stop blowing; and the melted and mangled 7C24 became an objet d‘art that hung around the station for months.

So now you know what I consider my salad days.

1Yes, I was there, although the picture at the top of this post is from before my time.  I’m on the cover of the August ’71 Program Guide just left of the gate.  I’m sitting on a big metal box that housed the electric company’s transformer that supplied power to the transmitter.

<aside>
Hey, PZ:  do you remember Jon Gallant, a biology professor at the University of Washington?  He’s also in the photo.

I heard rumors, not confirmed by me, that the fellow on the far right, Tiny Freeman, was the engineer in the opening title sequence of Petticoat Junction.  It seems that he was one of the few people who could still safely operate a 4-4-0 American at track speed.
</aside>

2One of KRAB’s more infamous programs:  the kid playing the temple bells tape thought, “That was cool; I’ll turn it over and play the other side.”  Uh…it was a full-track tape, and so he played the whole thing backwards (and thought that was even cooler).  That was before my time, but it was a well-established part of the station’s tribal lore.

3“…everything, except time, stopped dead” shamelessly borrowed from an essay by the late Greg Palmer written during his time as station manager.  I’m pretty sure it was in a KRAB Program Guide, but I can’t remember which one and can’t find it.  In any event, that wonderful turn of phrase is not my work.

Hello world!

OK, here’s my first post on FreethoughtBlogs.

I’m a retired computer programmer who continues to serve on the ISO standards committee for the C++ programming language.  One of the reasons that I retired from my day job after June of ’22, aside from being 76 years old, is that, for the last several years, I’d been writing nothing but Java, which I found rather frustrating.

I’m also quite the geek when it comes to riding on passenger trains.  I’m not at all nostalgic about them; I just think that trains are a good way to travel today.

I’ll probably write mostly about C++ and riding on Amtrak; but I reserve the right to become obsessed when someone is wrong on the Internet.

For my commenting policy, I’ll start out using PZ’s Pharyngula as a model.  We’ll see how that goes.  If a comment points out some error I made in a post, I’ll acknowledge the error in a comment of my own and fix it like Mano does.

I’ll begin with a very short rant from my wires-and-pliers days, just to have something out there besides this “Howdy” post.  Around the first of February, I’ll describe a trip that I’ll be taking to Issaquah, Washington, to attend a meeting of the ISO C++ committee.

Please feel free to suggest other topics that I might know something about, including digital electronics from the SSI and MSI TTL era (I haven’t done it in a while), and listener-supported FM broadcasting.  I’ve also worked for a couple of commercial radio stations, and I once had a 1st Phone (which is no longer a thing), but I was always weak in the practical aspects of RF, being mostly an audio guy.