I decided not to fly from Seattle to San Diego for a number of reasons and decided instead to take a combination of a train to San Francisco and a bus from San Francisco to San Diego.
One of the reasons was that I was attempting to conduct a psychological experiment of sorts. I thought that if the trip down to Campo was so long, tiresome and unappealing, I wouldn’t want to do it again. I wouldn’t want to bail on the trail and have to retrace my voyage back home to Washington the same way I had arrived, and that maybe that would be additional motivation to just keep walking the 2,000 miles back to Washington.
I also love trains. I’ve traveled by rail through a good portion of Europe, and across both China and Japan by high speed rail. When I lived in Boston and Philadelphia, I relied pretty solely on various types of trains – subways, the regional trains, Amtrak or an occasional Acela for days that I worked in NYC.
I love trains, but unfortunately the US rail system really doesn’t compare to other countries. The trains are slow AF. Even our alleged high speed trains are as slow as regional trains in other countries. The design of the trains is of pure utility, rather than of comfort or a pleasing aesthetic, and then there’s the added factor of traveling with trains that are generally full of Americans.
When I boarded the train in Tacoma, I was handed a piece of paper with some letters on it written in marker, and three sets of numbers written in pencil. I didn’t know what the letters, the numbers or the paper itself was for. The conductor told me to get on the last train car. I sat in the last row of the car where it was quiet. Other people had put the pieces of paper above their seats so I put mine above my seat too.
A few hours later, a young family with 2 very small children got on the train and sat across the aisle. They were obnoxiously loud – the parents included. So much so that there seemed to be no way it wasn’t completely intentional. I was regretting not springing for a sleeper car. One of the kids threw a toy and it hit me. The parents mumbled a very insincere apology. I was annoyed and started deeply regretting my decision. I put in my headphones and tried to sleep.
I awoke to the dad shaking me awake telling me I needed to move seats because his son needed to take a nap. Excuse me?? I just stared at him and he said he had paid for 4 seats so I needed to move. Again, excuse me?? I also paid for a seat. He kept going on about how I needed to move and his toddler son needed my seat and I pointed to the piece of paper with the random letters and numbers that I stuck above the seat. He told me the “30” on the piece of paper was my seat number. It turned out that I actually was in his seat. I don’t know why he didn’t lead with that vital piece of information by just saying, “excuse me, but you’re sitting in our assigned seats”.
I moved, kind of annoyed that they didn’t just say something when they first got on the train rather than their passive aggressive attempts at being so obnoxious hoping I’d decide to leave. It couldn’t have been less clear that there were assigned seats since there was no seat number on my ticket, I never selected a seat, what did that piece of paper even mean, and since when are there assigned seats on Amtrak?
I left and found my assigned seat and it could not have been a worse seat. It was an aisle seat next to the stairway and people kept bumping into me, they were loud while walking up to the upper deck, and some guy was snoring. This was an overnight train for context. The girl I sat next to was cool and was going on her own solo exploration around the US. Around 2am I ended up going and finding an empty seat with no piece of paper above it and nobody sitting in it so I could sleep away from the noise. I probably got one hour of sleep but at 3am the same conductor who gave me zero instructions on where to sit in the first place woke me up and told me I had to move because other people were boarding into those seats and I had to sit in my assigned seat. I eventually moved back to my seat, but literally nobody even boarded that car or sat in those seats, and they were still empty hours later when I got off the train.
Amtrak also doesn’t go to downtown San Francisco. It goes to Emeryville and then part of the journey is taking a 30 minute bus ride. On the bus, I wanted to keep my backpack with me and since there were open seats, I kept it on the seat next to me. The girl I had sat with on the train was seated next to a woman across the aisle who dropped her wallet down on the floor and started raising her voice and asked the girl to get up so she could find it. We were driving by then and the girl said she didn’t want to stand up on the bus while it was moving and she would help the woman find the wallet once the bus stopped. The woman kept telling the girl to stand up anyway and seemed to be escalating things so I stuffed my bag onto my lap and told the girl she could come sit next to me instead. We laughed and agreed that next time we’d both rather just fly. Lessons learned.
I guess mission accomplished – that was probably the worst train experience I’ve ever had. It could have been far worse, but it was unpleasant enough I wouldn’t do it again.
I hope to cherish these bad memories on the trail enough to not want to quit and have to ever have to take another long distance Amtrak train again, that apparently, has assigned seats.
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