Trip Report: March 14 - 25, 2002
by Ted & Sylvia Blishak
CULTURAL TOUR OF THE PACIFIC COAST
PORTLAND TO SEATTLE
Day 3. March 16, 2002
Our Cascade Talgo to Seattle does not leave until 12:30pm, so we have a leisurely morning in Portland. The predicted snow did not fall, but it was cold and windy when we walked to the Portland Hilton to enjoy their buffet breakfast. The price here is $13.95, a full 56% more than the buffet at the Eugene Hilton, but there are more strawberries and a greater selection of pastries. Everything is more expensive in Portland. From our hotel room at the Westin, local phone calls are 99 cents vs. 50 cents at the Eugene Hilton. Toll free calls are also 99 cents while they were free in Eugene. And it only gets worse when we go further north to Seattle.
Sylvia wants to check out the 80% off sale of winter clothing at Meier & Franks department store, and we run the gauntlet of beggars at every entrance for the 10am opening. She could not find anything suitable anyway. Before we know it, checkout time and train time are approaching, and I call for a bellman and a taxi. We time this one pretty close and find ourselves at the steps of the Business Class car as the all aboard is called at 12:28pm.
Travel Tip: Don't do as we do and assume that there will be a bellman and a taxi available on a moment's notice. At the 12 noon checkout time, a hotel lobby can be quite busy with guests leaving.
There are two Talgo trains at Portland Union Station, the one we are boarding for Seattle, and across the platform, the one which just arrived from Eugene. Remember what we told you, the 9:30am Talgo service from Eugene does not go through to Seattle, you must change trains in Portland. Contrary to what I said in a previous report, however, the Starlight is not the only through service from Eugene to Seattle. There is a 5:45am Cascade that arrives in Seattle at 12:15pm. I have just never been awake in Eugene at 5:45am, nor have I had a client who asked for this early departure. The timing is for commuters from Eugene, Albany, and Salem wishing to arrive in Portland for a day of business.
Our train to Seattle is quite full. The dining car is full of mothers and very young children going, perhaps, on their first train ride, from Portland to Vancouver, Washington, our next stop. As we depart from Vancouver there are only three empty seats in Business Class. It is raining quite heavily now, and we relax with the morning paper while watching automobiles drive through the spray of eighteen wheelers on adjacent Interstate 5. Soon the rain turns to snow and the situation becomes quite slippery outside. But we are right on schedule, and as we approach the southern end of Puget Sound the sun comes out to illuminate in the distance the Tacoma Narrows Bridge, known infamously as "Galloping Gertie". This is the bridge whose original deck collapsed in a 1940 windstorm shortly after its opening. It is now reinforced, of course, and bridge builders learned a lot from this fiasco.
We pass two Sounder commuter trains parked in the Tacoma yards. Apparently there is no weekend service. After Tacoma, there is a stop in Tukwila, something new. Tukwila is a Sounder stop, just about 15 miles south of Seattle. We arrive at Seattle's King Street Station a few minutes ahead of schedule, and we observe the Superliner Empire Builder pulling into the station for boarding. Outside the station, the Thruway bus from Vancouver, BC, is arriving to make its connection with the Empire Builder as we stand in the organized taxi line.
(For those of you interested in the progress of the King Street Station renovation project, there is none. The only change that I observed is the removal of the snack wagon from the waiting room.)
A short taxi ride through downtown Seattle reveals that many buildings are either under construction or renovation, as usual. Seattle has always been a work in progress. Perhaps the planned renovation of the Amtrak station is being delayed because all the local construction firms are busy with other projects?
We check into the Sheraton and are greeted by enthusiastic and helpful doormen and bell-persons who deposit us and our luggage into a newly-refurbished hotel with the latest in lavish carpets, furniture, and wallpaper. This hotel seems to be nearly empty, a sign that the travel industry is still in a state of optimistic recovery.
Did we predict that the further north we go the higher the prices? We were shocked at the price of the in-room bottled water in Portland at $3.00 a liter. Here in Seattle, it is $5.00 a liter! We ask if there is a convenience store nearby and walk a couple of blocks to stock up. At Rite Aid, we find 1.5 liter bottles for 99 cents, and get some much-needed exercise too.
We walk back through the rain, quite literally. Seattle rain has a peculiar characteristic. It falls slowly and mistily, so that even if you're under an umbrella you walk right into it and your face and clothing are soon covered with water.
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