It takes 35 hours to get from Los Angeles to Seattle on Amtrak’s Coast Starlight train. Thirty-five. Hours.
Tasked with finding out what it’s like to ride a train for a day and a half, I armed myself with books and crosswords to combat boredom, an extra hoodie to serve as blanket and pillow leverage, and a bag of toiletries to limit my own contributions to the odors of the showerless.
I figured that even if I was cramped, cranky and wild with cabin fever by Hour 8, at least I’d be entertained and perfumed.
Here’s how it all went down.
10 a.m. (Hour 1; Union Station, Los Angeles)
I boarded with ease at Union Station a half-hour before our 10 a.m. departure time. There were no long security lines, no baggage check, and the train was right on time. On board, I had my choice of seats. I stretched out into a surprisingly roomy seat that would be my workspace, bed and possibly my torment for the next 35 hours.
I settled into a practically empty business class car (it was only 30 bucks more than a coach ticket), where I was greeted by business-class car attendant Raymond Luna who reassured me when I told him Seattle was my destination.
“Oh you’re with me all the way?” he said, “OK, I got you.”
11 a.m. (Hour 2; Simi Valley, Calif.)
The ocean views begin in earnest and were absolutely stunning. At times, the train ventures closer to the coast than the highway and offers glimpses of beaches so isolated they seemed like tiny desert islands.
In the lounge car, passengers sit in swiveling chairs facing the floor-to-ceiling windows that run along both sides of the car, some excitedly hold cellphone cameras to the glass, while others just blend into the charming scene as they sip wine and read in the natural light as the countryside jogs past.
Many of the views along the way are as incredible as I’d imagined. In Southern California, the sunny beaches and vast ocean views seem to stretch from right under the wheels of the train all the way to the ends of the Earth. In Northern California and Oregon, the snowy landscape seems at times to press right up against the train windows before breaking open into vast valleys that literally sparkle as the sun gleams off the snow, streams and lakes.
Even the more mundane scenes of daily life captured the imagination as we passed through residential areas and caught momentary glimpses into backyards.
In one rural town, the whole community seemed to be outdoors, working their lawn mowers and landscaping projects on a Sunday afternoon. In a small suburb, two women sat in a backyard eating birthday cake amid an otherwise empty circle of tiny chairs decorated with balloons.
4 p.m. (Hour 6; San Luis Obispo, Calif.)
Just after the San Luis Obispo station we pass the tall, foreboding walls of the California Men’s Colony, a prison. From the train, I spy a small courtyard inside the walls, where a couple of prisoners wander along the confined circular path. Such a sobering contrast to the privilege of my thousand-mile journey up the coast.
5 p.m. (Hour 7; Paso Robles, Calif.)
I would have thought that seven hours of staring out the window might make me antsy to move around, but I have to tear my eyes away from the window to try to get some work done. Unsuccessful, I nod off and wake up to an announcement that the dining car was accepting dinner reservations.
6-9 p.m. (Hours 8-11; Salinas to Oakland, Calif.)
The dining-car experience is basically an awkward social experiment. If you’re rolling solo like I am, the dining-car attendants seat you in a four-person booth with three strangers and leave you to comment on the weather and navigate conversational land mines.
My tablemates are a father and son from Arizona and a teacher from the Bay Area. We dutifully make conversation out of the menu options. I choose the thyme roasted chicken breast ($18.50), and do not regret it. The mashed potatoes have the slightest taste of cardboard that indicates they probably came from a box, but I am surprised to find the chicken tender, juicy and well-seasoned.
Soon we graduate to more interesting topics. The father and son, it turns out, also boarded in L.A. and are Seattle-bound. They plan on jumping right back on the train the morning after they arrive in Seattle to going straight back to L.A. in time for a family reunion. They are on a sort of father-son retreat, they say. It is all for the Coast Starlight experience itself.
Eventually, after I bring up that I’d gone to hear Kimberle Crenshaw talk in L.A., the teacher and I begin a nerdy conversation about intersectionality and white allyship that lasts until the dining car empties and he has to disembark in Oakland.
10 p.m. (Hour 12; Emeryville, Calif.)
Back in my seat and still energized by the conversation, I stay awake, staring out the window until the lights from San Francisco shining across the bay disappear, and the views fade into pitch darkness. Luna hands out pillows, and generously offers me a second pillow with a look that says, “trust me, you’ll need it.”
11 p.m.-7 a.m. (Hours 13-21; Martinez, Calif., to Klamath Falls, Ore.)
I try the knee-hug, but quickly abandon it for a solid recline, which eventually morphs into a semi-upright fetal position across the two seats, happily unobstructed by an armrest. Then, it is back to the knee-hug.
In short, I don’t sleep very well. But when I wake up to snow-covered evergreens of southern Oregon sweeping past my window I quickly forget about the cramp in my neck.
9 a.m. (Hour 23; Chemult, Ore.)
This time I have a table to myself in the dining car, accompanied by a book and a coffee, and a cozy wintry scene outside my window.
The little plastic cup of Tostitos salsa that arrives on my breakfast plate kind of maims the charming scene. The flavorless omelet and the home fries that somehow manage to be both soggy and too dry at the same time nearly sends the romance into its death throes.
But no amount of depressing eggs could ruin the charm of enjoying a cup of coffee with a snow mountainscape brushing past the windows and an adorable couple sitting next to each other a few booths away looking out at the snow.
1 p.m. (Hour 27; Eugene, Ore.)
Everyone in the lounge car seems to have been lulled into the same peaceful mood. Hours pass before I look up from my book to find that the snowy landscape has become lush green.
3-6 p.m. (Hours 29-32; Portland, Ore., to Olympia-Lacey)
Luna announces over the speakers that we are nearing Portland and warns us to move to the left side of the train if we wanted the best views of Puget Sound en route to Seattle.
6-9 p.m. (Hours 33-35; Seattle)
In the last hours of my trip, I feel as if I am only just gaining a degree of fluency in train life. I’d learned how to walk a straight-ish line in rhythm with the jostling cars and had new theories on sleeping positions I wanted to try.
A couple of hours after sunset absconded with the Puget Sound views, the train staff begins to bustle about the cars, making preparations for arrival in Seattle.
I am shocked to find that I am not ready for the trip to be over! I had just spent 35 hours on a train, and, despite the bad omelet and the awkward sleeping postures, I want more time. It had been exactly the kind of slowdown I’d needed and a fascinating way to experience the coast.
When I disembark at King Street Station, I linger in the station, still not ready to relinquish this slowed-down version of my life. I feel a tap on my shoulder and turn to find the father and son I’d met in the dining car.
We share a ride from the station, and I send them off with well wishes and a bit of envy that they will be back on the train the next day. Back at home, the envy and nostalgia wanes after a hot shower and a good night’s rest in my own bed.
