I decided to do this series about rail travel, but I honestly have very little (or no) rail travel experience. I have ridden the train at the Magic Kingdom and helped my son get a Boy Scout railroad merit badge. My wife and I also dined on a Bourbon Trail Dining Train in Bardstown, KY for our 10th Anniversary, but other than that, I have no rail experience.
Even though I have no experience, the idea of rail travel has intrigued me for some time. My father-in-law liked rail travel and Kathy and I had to pick him up at the station very early one morning when he came to visit us from Wisconsin. I will say that did make an impression and I became interested in the idea of rail travel. So much so that I did actually plan a trip with my son, Tim, involving rail travel.
I offered Tim a travel experience for a graduation gift from college and he wanted to travel on a train. He considered traveling to Chicago for a weekend, but looking at the schedule, we discovered that would allow no time to visit the city. So, we looked at the route going east and a stop in Washington DC did allow some time there, but still not much. So, we decided to fly to DC and take the train back. The cost was about the same as a round trip train ticket.
Well, to make a long story short, on our first evening of touring in DC, I got a call from Amtrak stating that our train trip had been cancelled due to snowstorm conditions on the route back from New York state. So, we had to scramble to find airline tickets back home, thus no train ride. I enjoyed that trip immensely, but I still have a desire to do rail travel at some point in the future.
