[PRCo] Re: Montana Travelogue

Tue Jul 28 14:50:09 EDT 2009

I've been to Glacier at least twice ... I would have to look at the  
dates on the slides ... might be three times.   I know I stayed at  
the former Great Northern Railroad lodge at Essex twice, once with  
Bruce Bente and once with my wife (2007).   Only once have I been  
able to drive through the park on the Going to the Sun Highway.

The first time with Bruce we rode one of the Jammers.   Since we  
could not go through the park, it became an impromptu tour.   The  
lady driver made it up as we went.   When lunch time came she said  
there was an official place where she was supposed to take us to  
enrich the coffers of the politically correct people and the other  
choice was an Indian owned restaurant on the Blackfeet Nation east of  
the park that she believed was much better.   We were told to vote on  
it.   We went to the indian restaurant.   When I spied a rainbow and  
yelled.   She stopped and some of us poured out to photograph the old  
White with the rainbow.   It was one great day.

The next day they had the highway open so Bruce or I (don't remember  
who) drove my red VW Passat over the top).

Then in 2007 I took Marie there, staying again at Essex with a room  
facing the tracks.  Surprisingly, I'm the one who would like to see  
the trains at night and I slept through it.   They kept her awake.    
Again the road over the top was closed.   We could only get up to the  
heavy stone work in your picture on the west side.   The ranger we  
talked to said the damage over the winter was worst in his lifetime.

I guess my problem with travel is that I have come to appreciate  
being close to the ground and seeing what is there ... the Ukrainian  
restaurant in Manitoba, the little US 66 museum in Oklahoma, the  
spring desert flowers in Arizona, even the sudden impromptu chartered  
airplane flight just to photograph farms in Nebraska ... and you  
can't do that when you're locked into an Amtrak schedule.   I've  
traveled an estimated 1.25 million miles in my life by car on two  
continents plus rail and bus on three continents.   My folks taught  
me the art of just getting in the car in the morning and aiming it in  
the direction you wanted to go.   It matters not what you see, only  
that you enjoy your self, find beauty, and learn from the experience.

I also have to admit that I've been spoiled.   I know what it was  
like to ride on the Southern Railway in pre Amtrak days when the food  
was cooked in the diner and served on China.   When I told the waiter  
that the steak was not done like ordered, he scooped up everything.    
I protested.   I said the vegetables were fine.   He said, "Please,  
Sir.   Give me a chance to make everything perfect."   It was perfect  
the second time around.   I remember the Erie-Lackawanna's crispy  
corn fritters on the Lake Cities.   I also rode the Wabash Banner  
Blue and the Santa Fe's Texas Chief.   The Pennsy paled by comparison  
to them and yet we would love to have the PRR back today because it  
was so much better than Amtrak ... at least the Pennsy knew how to  
get you there on time and the food was at least passable even though  
I could easily find better restaurants.

I've had delicious white fish on British Railways and superb veal on  
German Federal Railways too.   On the other hand, I also remember a  
German lady trying to run people out of her diner because they only  
wanted a beer at 3 in the afternoon ... theeese vagen ees for meeels  
only.   Ve serve beer mit meels.   You cannot sit here and not order  
meel.   Of course there was no one else wanting to eat at three  
o'clock ... stupidity is everywhere.

I have been insulted on Amtrak by a club car attendant who told me to  
put my food back in the case because he didn't open for another two  
minutes.   And then when he did open, he had the unprecedented gall  
to suggest I put money in his tip jar.   I suggested that if he had  
worked for the Southern under Claytor before this was an Amtrak  
train, he would have been fired for his attitude.   Oh yes, there was  
also the Amtrak conductor last summer or the summer before who had a  
Japanese tourist arrested for taking a picture out the window in  
Connecticut.   The poor visitor was a subversive?

I've crossed the United States enough times by auto that I have  
forgotten the trips.   Most were from the east coast.  Some were from  
home to the west coast.   Some I went half or two thirds of the way  
across.   In some cases I flew to California, met my friend Don Duke,  
and worked half way back  (Los Angeles to El Paso to Tucumcari to  
Albuquerque and back or Los Angeles to Seattle and back or Los  
Angeles to Reno to San Francisco and back).  I've driven across  
country three times in the last five years.

Unfortunately they are normally radial to home or up the west coast  
or along the Gulf Coast.   Sometime I would like to start at  
Brownsville Texas and drive north into Manitoba to get a feeling for  
how the plants change with latitude and temperature instead of simply  
elevation at the same latitude.   I've been in all those places along  
the route but I need to have the route hammered into me.

My most recent trip cross country excursion was March and April  
2009:   I put (get this) 9898 miles on the car driving from Lancaster  
to Little Warshington, Indianapolis, then along the abandoned Indiana  
Railroad to Louisville, Owensboro (I collect cities of 50,000 or  
larger and that is one I had to add to the list), Evansville (another  
city of 50,000), Cairo (the most down in the mouth city I've ever  
seen), New Madrid MO (the earthquake museum), Bentonville AR (had  
breakfast with a high school classmate), Albuquerque (rode the new  
commuter rail line from Belen to Santa Fe), Four Corners (had to  
honor a friend who wanted to go there to piss in four states on one  
bladder .... no I didn't ... you don't really do that with 20 indians  
selling merchandise), Canyon de Chelly AZ (fabulous), Phoenix (the  
new light rail), Tucson (the heritage trolley and the air museum),  
Organ Pipe Cactus National Park, San Diego (a chunk of the light rail  
I never rode), Escondido (the diesel light rail to Oceanside), Perris  
(the trolley museum), Los Angeles (a buddy and the construction of  
two light rail lines), Death Valley National Park, Las Vegas (had to  
ride the monorail and have dinner with Ken Josephson and visit  
Boulder Dam), Grand Canyon (Bruce Bente had never been there),  
Sonoma, Phoenix (more light rail and drop my friend who was with me  
since Phoenix), over the mountain on the old road to Lordsburg and El  
Paso, US 95 across Texas, Big Bend National Park, more of US 95  
including Judge Roy Bean's shack, the southern tip of Texas including  
the girls in bikinis on the beach at South Padre Island, Galveston  
(the trolleys have not moved since the hurricane), New Orleans (the  
trolleys were running), Mobile (another for the 50,000 rule and a few  
pictures), Selma AL (to have dinner with a high school buddy and  
celebrate passover in the synagogue in Montgomery with him and his  
wife), Savannah (ride the bi-diesel trolley), Charlotte (photograph  
the light rail), Charlottesville (social call on William D.  
Middleton, a friend of 46 years) and home through Big Washington and  
Baltimore.   I used up a digital card on the Nikon D90 and about 20  
rolls of Fuji Astia in the F100 Nikon.   (By the way, I have well  
over 90% of the cities of 50,000.   Most of those I'm missing are  
suburbs of major cities, mostly in Los Angeles or Houston or Dallas- 
Fort Worth.)

On Jul 28, 2009, at 1:03 PM, Dennis Fred Cramer wrote:

> We traveled from Pittsburgh to Whitefish and back via Amtrak.  Four  
> days on the train and six days in Glacier National Park.  There are  
> a few transportation pictures throughout.
>
>
> http://sites.google.com/site/dfctravels/montana-2009
> Dennis F. Cramer
>       Trombone
>
>
>