For quite a while, I've been looking for an alternative to my normal modes
of transportation between the Monterey Bay area and Las Vegas.
By car, it's 8 hrs with no stops, 10 hrs with stops.
By air, it's 6 hrs point-to-point but you're tied to a schedule and
strip-searched and the goodies in your luggage are pilfered by TSA.
So I got on the AMTRAK web site searching for excursion fares sort of like
the Eurail pass you always hear about. Turns out the best way to find out more
is to go to an AMTRAK station and ask.
Our local station (Salinas) is probably like a lot of others, it wasn't busy
& the agent had plenty of time to answer all my questions, look up fares &
give me details on all the passes.
In a nutshell, AMTRAK has several passes. Of note:
--California pass: 7 travel days in a 21-day period within California.
--Florida pass: 12 months unlimited travel within Florida.
--6 geographic areas in the US. The continental US is cut up into 6 zones &
unlimited (?) travel is permitted within those zones. Details look on AMTRAK
web site _www.amTRAK.COM_ (http://www.amTRAK.COM)
--North America Rail Pass: 30 days of travel in US and Canada (one stop must
include Canada). If you have the energy, you can make 2 tours of the US and
Canada.
Cut to the point: I bought the California Rail Pass ($159) because
destinations include Las Vegas, Reno, Sparks, South Lake Tahoe, and Carson City. Trip
times are 12 hrs from Salinas - Las Vegas via inland route (bus to Merced,
train to Bakersfield, bus to Las Vegas) or 16 hrs via coast route (train to
Santa Barbara, buses to Las Vegas).
Yes it is a lot longer by train, but you can sleep or work on a train and I
did both. I went to an observation car where a seat was available at a table
and spread out. Quite a few people had laptops with movies or games on it. I
was looking forward to arriving in Las Vegas refreshed and relaxed and I would
have been except when we stopped in Hanford, I got off and the train left
without me. Had to rent a car to catch up with my luggage in Bakersfield.
Station agent in Hanford called conductor to take it off. Fortunately I have GPS
on my cell phone otherwise I would have had a heck of a time getting from one
unknown location to another. Completed the rest of the trip by rental car &
had to return it to Hanford where I picked up the train again. Uneventul
return home where I was the only passenger on the Merced to Salinas bus (from the
freebie paper in the station, there was a blurb about it being common for the
Merced - Salinas bus to average 1/2 passengers).
Lessons learned:
-- Don't get off the train. Stops at some places are for only 2 - 3 minutes.
-- Travel light. Airline luggage will fit in overhead but it's a very tight
fit. In both directions, it seemed like I was the only one using overhead as
there was nothing in them when I opened it up. Both directions, trains were
about 90 - 95% full traveling Fri - Mon.
Cost Comparisons:
I won't get anal about this but this was a real bargain. I have one car that
gets 19 mpg and it would have cost more in gas than the train ticket.
Another car gets 31 mpg so gas would have been a bit over $100 however that's for
one trip and I still have 5 more days to use this ticket.
Time comparisons:
No contest. You need plenty of time. And if you're me, you need even more
time for those days when things go wrong which is about every day now.
Comments:
My trip to LV was a consistent bust from the time I missed the train to
short stays at the Venetian and Fiesta Henderson. Maybe it was karma, but the
rental car allowed me to cut short my stay (and losses) at Venetian and switch
to Fiesta Henderson (where I still lost but it took a bit longer).
In spite of all this, have to look past these negatives and attribute it to
just my luck. Would I do it again. Definitely!
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]