Chicago Bound!!!

[UPTRAIN]

I'm leaving in about 40 minutes to go to the station to board the Northbound Amtrak Texas Eagle train number 22!!! Talk to you all when I get back on the 15th!!! BYE!!![:)][:D][8D][:p][;)][^]

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by UPTRAIN

I'm leaving in about 40 minutes to go to the station to board the Northbound Amtrak Texas Eagle train number 22!!! Talk to you all when I get back on the 15th!!! BYE!!![:)][:D][8D][:p][;)][^]

Deadheading?

Coach?

or Bedroom?

Lucky dog you. [;)] <Yeah, Jim is jealous> [}:)]

[eolafan]

Hope you will enjoy your trip to our metro area and city, huge opportunites (too many to count) to "foam". Have fun and stay safe and cool (over 90 degrees here today but seventies for the weekend).

[Anonymous]

Zach [8D]

I "see" you are in the forums. [;)]

Back so soon, or on the computer in a hotel room?

I hope you got pics. [;)]

You know how the "guys" on msn messenger all like them. [:p]

Later.

[UPTRAIN]

I am back, got back home at 1:37 a.m. CDT, we pulled into Poplar Bluff, Missouri at 1:13 a.m., just 11 minutes late!!! We never had to stop even ONE TIME for a freight to pass us!!! We had to stop 2 times going northbound and 1 time going southbound for 3 trains to get on the SIDING for US!!! I was impressed with CN/IC because we didn't fall off an overpass onto the interstate (See CN/IC coal train wreck thread from southern Illinois)!!! We departed here Tuesday morning about 25 minutes late at 3:30 a.m. We arrived into Chicago Union Station shortly after 4:30 p.m. on Tuesday, caught a cab, and went to the Travelodge motel about a mile from Lake Michigan and about a half mile from the Sears Tower at 65 East Harrison. Ordered Room Service, slept, got up around 10 Wednesday Morning, caught a cab back to CUS and waited at gate E for about 3 hours reading, talking, and watching trains and people arrive and depart. We saw SCORES of locomotives, about 90 count on Tuesday, close to 100 or so subway/CTA trains from the 11th floor window at the Travelodge. Back to the locomotives, I really wanted to see a few METRA units during the trip, I saw 1 on Tuesday but about 20 or so on Wednesday, including some new MPI MP38PHM-3s and some F40PH as well as F40PHM-2. I wanted to see the good ole F40PH at work again!!! I saw Lennox Tower in Illinois, the Rock Island Tower at Joliet, as well as the newish ballpark beside the station. We were about an hour ahead of a NASTY tornado that ripped it's way across the Illinois flatland near Roenoke and Bloomington, Illinois. We could see the ominous clouds off to the west as we raced at 79 mph northward. I saw some ex-BN, AT&SF, IC, and GT locomotives. I saw many BRC, METRA, UP, CN, BNSF, AMTRAK, CTA, and even a UTAH RAILWAY locomotive at Granite City, Illinois. It's a long way from Utah let me tell ya that!!! [:D]

[UPTRAIN]

Oh yeah Jim, standard sleeper, up and back, got the lower level going up but high level coming back, northbound we had a flat wheel about 10 feet from out head, it put us right to sleep...I recorded about 5 minutes of flatwheel and some diamonds to put me asleep on sleepless nights....ahhhhhhhh. I need to use that recording now, night all!!!

[daveklepper]

MAY YOU ENJOY MANY MORE SUCCESSFUL TRIPS. HOW WAS THE DINING CAR?

[UPTRAIN]

It was great, we ate breakfast in St. Louis, lunch near Bloomington, and dinner near Springfield coming back in the sleeper, ahh roomservice!!!