Day Zero

If you don't want a lot of details about my trip, then skip this post and any others that posted in the next few days that have titles like "Day One" etc.  If you do, read as much as you like.

Ahem.

Day Zero.  The great task of last week was getting ready for the Great West Coast Extravaganza (GWCE).  To do this I needed to do several things.

I needed to

Get my classroom/lesson plans/copies/students ready for a sub
Pack/do/laundry/decide what I was packing in
Pay rent/car payment/other bills due at the beginning of the month
Go climbing (I wouldn't be able to for a week!)
Go skating (I wouldn't be able to for a week!)
Remember to water the plants.

All of this did get accomplished, but it involved some stress, some craziness, and a lot of extra hours at school.  I even bribed Cuny to come and staple packets for me while I frantically put together other stuff.  Finally, Thursday afternoon, the school stuff was already.  Cuny and I had time for a quick skate, and then it was time to pack.

The original plan was for Al and I to each check one bag (Did you know you can check bags on trains?  Cool, huh?).  We decided the bags that would be the most space efficient and easiest to maneuver around the public transit we planned on taking around the cities would be internal frame backpacking packs.  We also had all intentions of packing light in a manner few girls can equal.  Which meant that we put all our stuff in piles and thought, There's no way that stuff is going to fill up those bags.  So we resolved to share a pack and thought, There's no way that stuff is going to fill up even one bag.  Which is how Allie and I came to pack entirely in our carry on bags.  I fit in only a small orange day bag and my computer bag (without the computer in it--who needs another ten pounds and $900 dollars worth of worry?).

Nearly all of our stuff. Piled in the middle of the floor, ready for departure.

Our train was to leave at 11:30 from the Salt Lake City Amtrak station.  Allie's brother was dropping us off at the station for our adventure to begin.  At about 8 p.m. Amtrak called us to tell us our train would be 3 hours late.  We later learned that the train had struck "something" in Colorado and had to change engines.  Our 11:30 train would now be leaving at 2:30. 

Derek waiting for the time to pass so he could take us to the station.  The poor man had drill the next day, too. 

Because we didn't want Al's brother to have to stay up with us, we had him drop us off at midnight.  Which is how we not only found out where the Salt Lake Amtrak station is, but also ended up hanging out in the station for hours in the early hours of the morning.  Since we had time to read every posted sign in the station, we learned that the SLC station is only open at night.  Because only two trains pass through SLC on a daily basis--one from east to west at 11:30 p.m. and one from west to east at about 3:00 a.m.--the station's operating hours are from 10:30 p.m. to 5:00 a.m.  So if you want to buy your tickets in person instead of online, you're going to be picking them up in the middle of the night.

Did I mention it was snowing?  It was snowing.  It was snowing a lot.  Allie and I were both in our pajamas (makes sense for an all night train ride) and our sandals.  Of course we wanted pictures next to the Amtrak sign.

Allie claims the picture is blurry because my camera is dumb.  I say it's blurry because I was shivering so much.

When the train finally arrived at 2 a.m., there were was an inch or two of snow to be stood in while the conductor (YES!  He was wearing a cap!) boarded families first. Then there was snow to be trudged through carrying our bags to our train car, which was, of course, at least four or five cars from the front.  We gratefully hung our tags bearing a handwritten notice of our destination above our seats--although we felt like we should pin them to our jackets like children in WWII or something--and collapsed into our seats.  Allie chugged some Nyquil (she's been sick) and I put on my fluffy socks.  We spent a minimum of time fiddling with our seats and getting comfortable and getting out headphones before sinking into sleep.  Sleeping on an Amtrak train is much more comfortable than sleeping on a plane, but you still want to change positions every hour or so to avoid getting too stiff.  So that's how we passed what remained of the night, as the train sped on through the snow across Utah and into Nevada.  The morning light would show us the excitement of Nevada in the snow, but that would be part of Day 1, which will be over-explained later.