Riding West on Amtrak's "Cardinal" (Part I)

Amtrak’s Northeast Regional and Acela often feel like microcosms of the cities that they travel between.  So do the stations, which become cities in miniature, as Bostonians, New Yorkers, and Philadelphians rub shoulders with folks from Baltimore and the capital region.  Washington's Union Station, the glorious Beaux-Arts monument whose front doors open to the Capitol, is one of these places-complete with a shopping mall.  Perhaps the grandest of the East Coast train stations, it possesses the elegance of Grand Central without the feeling that you might get run over by another passenger.  

This isn't my first trip on the Cardinal, and Union Station always gives me a sense of leaving the bustling east coast behind.  The ornate East Hall is the home of a steakhouse and and art dealers, while the old arrivals area includes the aforementioned food court and mall.  My destination, Charleston, WV, has seen a significant population and retail drain in recent years, and the more familiar names in the "mall"-Legal Seafoods, Shake Shack, Chop't, and even a mainstream retailer like H & M- are things that can't be found on the other end of my trip.

The Cardinal originates in New York and travels to Chicago via lines once traveled by New York Central and C & O passenger trains.  It feels entirely different from the Northeast Corridor, and not just because there is more legroom between the seats.  Once the doors close, the atmosphere changes instantly.  Having boarded a train that only runs three times a week, folks on board are not mere commuters or overnight business travelers, but travelers going somewhere outside of our eastern megalopolis.  As we emerge from the tunnel underneath the Federal Triangle, a plane on final approach to Reagan National flies overhead, but inside it is as if DC has already been left behind.

Seating is typically assigned by destination on long-haul trains, and can offer the opportunity to meet people you might have known-or in this case, taught-had you stayed home.  My seat is next to a young woman, a high school senior from southern West Virginia.  Her parents are divorced; her Dad lives on the Eastern Shore of Maryland where she has spent the last two weeks deep water fishing and clamming, and is riding as far as Hinton, where he mom will pick her up.  She reminds me of a lot of kids I knew from the statewide Baptist Youth fellowship growing up, as well as some of my first students in western Maryland.  Soft spoken and humble, the big city that we just left was clearly a place still unfamiliar to her, and I learn she plans to study nursing at one of West Virginia's small public colleges.  

The long rolling landscape is also an opportunity to catch up on reading.  I've brought a couple of issues of The New Yorker, as well as a book and a couple of scores to study.  Passing through Fredericksburg and Orange, it is a solid three hours to the smoke-break at Charlottesville.  This vestige of a time past is really a function of boarding; this is one of the most used stops on the line.  Passengers are warned not to step away from the train or enter the station, lest they be left behind.  Located a distance from UVA's main campus, the more remarkable areas of town are not visible.  Back on the train, the Blue ridge comes into view, and the slow climb towards Skyline Drive begins, leading to a tunnel underneath the famed two lane highway at an elevation of around 2000 feet.  (The approach to Skyline Drive is pictured at the top of this entry.) 

After crossing the Blue Ridge into the Valley, there is the stop that, on Friday afternoons, is a frequent favorite of the D.C. set: White Sulfur Springs and The Greenbrier Resort.  The candy-cane themed station, as tacky as the interior of the Greenbrier itself, lies less than 100 yards away from the entrance to the Resort, and the Old White TPC Course is visible from the train.

Departing White Sulfur Springs, it’s time for a trip to the dining car.  I’ve always found sitting at an uncrowded table to be the most comfortable of Amtrak placements, but in restaurant section of the car, you are seated, four to a table.  If you're by yourself, you'll be seated with strangers who may or may not become friends.  Another single man, heavy set and probably about my age, is seated next to me, while a retired couple is seated across. These are rail "veterans."  All from the South, the couple took the Crescent out of New Orleans and is now looping back towards Richmond to head home.  The gentleman next to me is from Florida.  Travel and food are topics of conversation, and politics is carefully avoided, aside from mutual concern for Amtrak’s future.  Lines like the Cardinal have been continually threatened by a minority in Congress over the years, but that minority now wields a considerable amount of power.  Dinner in the dining car is about the experience.  Wine and beer of low-medium quality are available, and there are four entrees on the dinner menu.  The foods (aside from a side salad) tend to be heavy on the salt, if not the fat, though one vegan/low sodium option is available.  Menus are occasionally changed, and it isn't the worst idea to look them up on Amtrak's website in advance. The most strictly health conscious should always pick up something at Chop’t back at Union Station.

Traveling along the Greenbrier River, where I took canoe trips as a Boy Scout, the train winds its way past Alderson to Hinton, where my high school seat-mate disembarks.  The train is less crowded now, and six hours into the journey, the most scenic part lies ahead.

Amtrak's Cardinal departs runs from New York's Penn Station to Chicago's Union Station on Sundays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and from Chicago to New York on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays.

www.amtrak.com

© 2017 Randall Stewart