Dan goes to New York

 Friday, September 20.

I’m at the Newark airport train station. There are four platforms and about eight tracks.     I just took a picture of New Jersey transit with a Pennsylvania heritage colour scheme on the engine.   I have a round-trip ticket to Penn Station.

Just saw my first Acela.   Amtrak’s higher-speed train in the Northeast corridor.   It did not stop at the Newark airport. It was on an inside track.

New Jersey transit train 3934.  You can ride trains all day long from Trenton New Jersey to New York City.  This is a bi-level car and I have a round-trip ticket.  

The ticket machine for Long Island Railroad wanted a pin for my credit card! I’ve never used a pin for my credit card so I ended up paying cash. I now have a pocket full of coins. I am taking Long Island Railroad to Jamaica and then I will take a bus to Donald Trump’s boyhood home .

Penn Station is humongous! I got off the Jersey transit, passed several other things to find the LIRR.  

There’s a stadium outside the Forest Hills station that looks like a lot of tennis courts and all the buildings around look like big English castle 

Some of the trains are so long that they won’t fit the train platform at some of the smaller stations. They come on the PA system and advise you to move forward if you want to get off.  I guess ridership is up if they have increased the length of their trains.

There is an ad on the train for heating oil     I can order it from my seat.     I live in Texas, what is heating oil?  Just kidding, I used to buy it when I lived in Germany.

Just boarded the Q30 bus.  when I got my round-trip bus ticket train ticket the machine gave me a card for the subway/bus.  Got on the bus. I saw that this Queens neighborhood is so densely populated the construction workers have to push sacrete on a cart across the street to do their work.    In Houston, they just back a cement truck up to the site, but there was no room on the street where I was.    

The book that I am using to find all of these presidential homes is called The Pesidential Libraries Bucket Journal.    It tells me that Donald Trump’s boyhood home is at 8515 Wareham Pl. in Queens.   I found a two-story cottage that was sitting empty and had eviction notices on the door. The lawn is a Mess.   There is even a yard sign that says "Do Not Take Kittens."  There are no signs or plaques that say this was ever part of the Trump family.    The rest of the neighborhood is very nice.    

Got back to the Long Island railroad station to find that I had missed the Oyster Bay train by a few minutes, so I walked down the street just a little bit to a local pizza and empanada place where they baked a fresh slice of veggie pizza for me.   Delicious.  

Got off the train at Oyster Bay and called an Uber to take me to the Roosevelt house at Sagamore Hill.    Things got crazy.  I left my phone in the Uber and spent the next several hours trying to fix the problem.     One of the other visitors to Teddy Roosevelt‘s house found the trouble number for Uber and passed his phone to me where we played tag with David, the driver for over an hour.   In the meantime, we took the tour of the house.     Teddy Roosevelt built this house on top of Sagamore Hill and raised six children in it. The house is full of mementos of his world travels to include stuffed animals and animal pelts all over the floor.    Our tour guide, Sara, was extremely knowledgeable and was able to answer all questions that were asked by the two children in our group. These children were asking about some of the most obscure things in the house and Sara knew about all of them.    While I was waiting for David to pick me back up with my now found phone, I went to the visitor center and learned more about Theodore Roosevelt, and bought a lot of souvenirs at the gift shop.    I knew that Teddy had won the Nobel Peace Prize for negotiating a piece between the Russians and the Japanese, and I knew that he was awarded the Medal of Honor for his exploits in Cuba, but did not realize the reason why the army did not see fit to award him this metal Until President Clinton awarded it to the family many years later.   Seems that Mr. Roosevelt drafted a letter to the army complaining that his rough riders were dying of malaria in Cuba long after the battle was over and that it was time to bring the boys home.    The army did not like it when he sent the letter to the press.   So it took a long time before he was awarded the Medal of Honor.

He and his family led very active lives.     When I went to buy my coffee mug, which I do for every president, the lady at the gift shop pointed out that I needed to buy Rough Rider Coffee since he drank about a gallon of it every day.   I also bought two books and my customary refrigerator magnet.   

Coming home, I rode a very quiet train as far as Jamaica.    My other trains had been quiet.  But the train in Jamaica, heading for Penn Station, on a Friday night, was anything but quiet! I am pretty sure that I sat in the middle of a bachelorette party all the way to Manhattan! It was wild! You will have to take my word for it as I was afraid to pull my camera out because I knew they would kill me!   There are things that I am smart enough to leave alone!

Tomorrow is Saturday and I’ll be heading to the Franklin Roosevelt Library and Museum in Hyde Park, New York.

Thursday, September 17, on the Amtrak Crescent

Thursday, September 19, 2024

 I woke up in North Carolina, and it was still fairly early when we hit Virginia. Claude, our Porter, told us to get the cameras ready. As we came out of a tunnel in southern Virginia we crossed the James river. Quite beautiful.

In DC, we spent a bit of time at the station whiled Amtrak changed out the two diesel engines for a single electric engine, as everything north east of DC is on electrified line. I was part of the sidewalk superintendent group supervising the train workers.. They tolerated me very well!

I detrained, Yes, that’s a word, at Newark New Jersey and got ready to board another train to the Newark airport, but I realized as I got ready to get on the train that I had forgotten to claim my baggage from Amtrak baggage. Ran around like a chicken with my head cut off and still made the train. 

I am staying in a hotel at the Newark airport because it’s about half the cost or less than anything I could find in Manhattan. I have a very nice King size bed in a king size room, and the bed is comfortable, and the breakfast was good.

A crazy thing about this Best Western, is that I can probably throw a baseball from the front door to the train station where I will head back to New York. But because of fences, parking lots, and whatever, going from the train station to my hotel involves a 1 mile trip on the airport Airtran People mover,  and a 2 mile roundabout trip on the hotel shuttle that I swear, went on and off of seven different freeways! Urban geography is different!

Next: New York City

From New Orleans on the Amtrak Crescent

Wednesday    I’m in car 2010, roomette five and we are going from New Orleans to New York .

Claude is my car attendant. He said he’s been doing this for 30 years.   I mentioned to Claude that the impression I have always gotten through my magazines was that Amtrak is the playground of the well-to-do since it is not cheap.    But what I saw yesterday and this morning is that everybody rides Amtrak and Claude confirmed that.    I met a lady yesterday named Wanda who’s travelled about 35 times on Amtrak. She lives in South Carolina. We shared an Uber to the train station and she’s well known at the hotel.    The Crescent departed right on time.    Claude was telling us they have problems with passengers who try to make up their own own berth and that’s how they get hurt.    The upper berth is stored about 2 feet higher than it’s nighttime configuration and if you don’t know what you’re doing you can drop this heavy upper bunk on your pumpkin head.  Since making up my berth is one of Claude's primary responsibilities, I will be happy to let him do that!

I saw a yard diesel with Amtrak colors parked close to the terminal.     It moves the cars around but in an emergency, like Katrina, they run a power cable from the diesel into the terminal and they can run the terminal off the locomotive.

      The room has a pulldown sink and a fold up toilet right in the roomette!    Seems to be more legroom than the sunset limited when the berths are made up.  

Two engines, three coaches, an observation/lounge/snack car, dining car, sleeper and a sleeper/baggage.     

I walked the three blocks from the depot to the hotel last night in New Orleans. Holiday Holiday Inn express is right around the corner from the World War II museum.   There are trolley tracks outside and the desk clerk said the trolley runs about every 15 minutes. The room is nothing fancy but the Bed was comfortable. Everything was clean and breakfast was quite good. I saw a new thing for a hotel breakfast: automatic pancake machine    Push the button, hold your plate under the end of it looks like a large toaster oven and you can watch the belt, carry the pancake batter and then flip it, and in a minute you’ve got a pancake.  Who knew?

The bad news is that sometime around 10 o’clock last night I found a bad piece of sidewalk or curb or something, but the New Orleans pavement threw me down onto the middle of the street! I skinned my knee for about the 5 millionth time in my life, both wrists hurt And I have a scrape just under the hairline on my forehead.   This morning, I am sore.      

The Sunset Limited from Los Angeles to New Orleans does not offer Wi-Fi     There is Wi-Fi on the Crescent but I’m under no illusions about how dependable it would be in the deep woods of Mississippi and Alabama.

Picayune Mississippi.    Nice name

My sleeper car has 13 roomettes, each with an upper and lower birth, a toilet and sink in the room, although I think I’ll go down the hall. Car also has three bedrooms that have considerably more room.     My porter said this train usually has 2 1/2 sleepers (the other half is baggage), but they pulled one of the cars for something else.     The end of the train is a baggage car/sleeper with 9 roomettes.    The engineer and the conductor are hour-limited by federal regulations so after eight hours or so we’ll have a crew change.   The attendant and the dining room staff travel from one end to the other and they have berths down here in the sleeper car area.

The dining car just got a new menu and while everything comes prepackaged, everyone is telling me the food is quite good     Passengers in the sleeper cars get their meals in the diner at no additional charge. Last night, as a coach passenger, I paid $45 to sit in the diner car.  The next car over has a snack bar and doubles has a lounge.   Coach passengers have to pay to eat in the dining car, and I found last night that was very expensive     Upfront, the three coaches each have room for at least one Wheelchair and a bathroom that appears to be rather accessible.   At the moment the lead coach is totally empty but my attendant tells me it will fill starting in Birmingham.  (Actually started filling in Hattiesburg).   The cars of this train are considerably newer than those are the sunset limited and the attendant pointed out to me that these cars were built for comfort.      The train is not full, so most people are sprawled out across several seats    Staff are very friendly and helpful.     

On my way to New Orleans

September 17, 2024, A Tuesday

 The German military strategist, Helmuth von Moltke, said in the mid 1800s, “No battle plan survives contact with the enemy.“   This is certainly true of my vacation!

Yesterday I was sifting through the ton of papers in my office trying to find all of my confirmation and tickets for this trip when I noticed I was missing one. The bed and breakfast a few miles from the Chester A Arthur home in upstate Vermont. I was finally able to contact the front desk, and wanted to make sure they had me down for the 27th of September . She came back a minute later and said my reservation was for the 26th! No changes allowed because this was booked through a third-party and in any case, we’re in the middle of “foliage.“  I looked at my schedule and decided that my side trip to Maine was going to have to wait. The lady at the bed and breakfast offered to help me as much as she could since I was now going to be at the Chester A. Arthur home on a day that they are not open. The very nice lady told me that her dog groomer was also the tour guide for the Arthur Home. This morning a very nice lady named Jane called and we set up a personal one-person tour on a Friday when they’re usually closed.   Is that nice? Or what? 

I’ve also been getting messages for the last 24 hours from Amtrak telling me of problems. Yesterday afternoon the train was sitting on the tracks east of El Paso because of a freight train. This morning it was sitting on the tracks East of San Antonio because of a disabled vehicle.   Despite that, we left only 12 minutes late. We’re still a little bit late and we’ve just crossed into Louisiana. 

My son dropped me off at the station early as he has somewhere else to go.    No problem, I checked my baggage, slung my backpack over my shoulder and walked a short distance to a place called Post Houston.   At one time, this was the main post office, but now it’s being redeveloped to host many functions to include a very nice food court

For future reference, if you take Amtrak East from Houston, the food court at Post Houston opens at 11 am. I had lunch at a delightful place called Chopn Blok They offer east and west African food.  My bowl was very flavorful and had rice and curry and chicken and plantains and a drink that tasted like very thick grape juice which the lady told me was hibiscus lemonade-basil.   It was actually too much food!

There are many other places at Post Houston, to include several that will serve some of the fanciest looking ice cream I’ve ever ever seen.   Place called "Sweet" seems to know 100 ways to serve Cotton candy!   The lady told me it’s very family-friendly on the weekends.    Who knew?   

  

Amtrak has apparently added a second coach to the Sunset Limited. The seats are much wider than on airplanes and the legroom is incredible     Just as a trivial note, the Tiny restroom has a baby changing table folded up into the wall! I was impressed!

It is 3:24 pm on Tuesday, September 17 and we are going through , I believe, Orange.    What should truly impress you about this particular post as I am doing it on the train on my iPhone, as it looks like my iPad is still in my house! Back to my opening quote.     I may post again later today    

Planning the Next Trip

 I now have firm plans and commitments for my Boston trip, September 17-Ocober 1.  I tell you something I really miss from the old days - travel agents!  I am supposed to do all of my planning at the computer.   The planning takes far longer than the trip itself.

I will take Amtrak to Boston.   Amtrak's "Julie" says the way to get to Boston is to take a bus to Longview, take the Texas Eagle to Chicago, and then take another train to Boston.   Sounds like how Southwest wants to route me home!   I found a better way.    Amtrak's Sunset Limited (Coach, it's cheaper) to New Orleans, overnight in a hotel on St Charles, take the Crescent to New York, stay a few days in Newark and then take the Acela to Boston.   Trying to book this on line, with a credit from my last voyage, and a few other variables was very frustrating.    I finally jumped in my Kia and drove downtown to the Amtrak station, where a very pleasant human being helped me with my tickets in short order.   Very satisfying.

Here is where i need your feedback.   I am doing this set of blogs from my phone and iPad, as the laptop takes up weight and space in my baggage.  Please comment, below as to whether you can view the video and any images.   

The little AMTRAK n scale train is a faithful model of the Sunset Limited.  The second car behind the engines is the sleeper.  I had a lower berth there to Los Angeles last month.   The last car in the consist is the coach, with airline-like seating.  I will ride it to New Orleans on September 17.

My credit cards have paid for trains to Boston, My hotels are booked thru Friday, September 27.   My Southwest flight from Hartford to Houston is also booked.   My hope is to pay off the credit cards now and by the end of my trip.  Just about done.

I was channel surfing during the Olympics and came across an episode of NOVA, on PBS.    They were talking about the longest wooden covered bridge in America, located in New York, not far from Albany, and also not far from Cooperstown, so now I will add a couple of bridges and some baseball to my final weekend.   I also hope to look at the Eastern terminus of the Erie Canal.

I am dictating this paragraph. This is a whole lot easier than typing on the iPad! Maybe you can teach an old dog new tricks!

Here is a shot of my layout.   The two modules were built in the 80s     I recently brought them out.  They and the other trackwork occupy a 9 x 5 area of my living room

Please comment below.   I think this works

Dan

Around Los Angeles

 I was too tired to write anything last night, Thursday, July 25, so let me get caught up.

On Wednesday evening, I found myself on 1st Street, between the Little Tokyo Metro Station, and my hotel.   There is a block of small Japanese cafes, several of which have waiting lists at the door.   I chose one at random and had a delicious bowl of ramen with beef, and some dumplings.

Thursday morning I decided to take the Metro A train to Long Beach.   Along the way, I took a detour to stand on a bridge above the Alameda Trench.    This is a long stretch of Union Pacific and BNSF multiple tracks, leading from the Port of Los Angeles, to the rail yards North and East of downtown Los Angeles.    Much of the trench is below street level, saving many miles of grade-level street crossings.    An incredible amount of container come from Asia, through Los Angeles/Long Beach, and on into the interior of America.

in Long Beach I visited the Aquarium.   Many summer camp groups.   My favorite exhibit was an aviary full of lorikeets!   You can buy a little cup of nectar and most of the time, the lorikeets would come over and drink the nectar, sometimes while perched on the child's arm!   There did not seem to be any rhyme or reason as to which bird would feed, and which child would be favored with this experience!  

Lorikeet on a child's hand, being fed nectar.

A note to my readers in Houston:   I traveled 2000 miles to see a Yellow-Crowned Night Heron in an enclosure!    The picture did not turn out, but keep in mind, I find juvenile Night Heron in my yard every Spring!

From the aquarium, I booked a 45 minute harbor tour (cue theme music from Gilligan's Island) which showed me, I guess, what I really wanted to see - Long Beach Harbor with ships, the Queen Mary, and the biggest container port in North America.

I apologize in advance, here, but I am going to do what I said I would not do, and that is get political.

The Supreme Court recently told cities and states they can push the homeless out of various places.   While I was riding around Los Angeles, I read that the California governor has now ordered cities to start doing just that.   Aside from the lack of compassion that we, as a "Christian Nation" are supposed to have, just where the heck are all of these down-and-out people going to go?   Is this the beginning of "Soylent Green?"  Los Angeles has a bigger problem with the homeless than even Houston, who claims to be fixing the problem, until you notice they are simply relocating from downtown Houston to, say, Southwest Houston.  We went to the moon, we cured polio and small pox, and I can move pictures from my phone to my laptop and share them with you in a timely manner.    Surely we can come up with a solution to homelessness!   I just filled out a survey about my Amtrak journey.   There were several questions asking about homelessness in the Amtrak Train Stations.  It's a problem that needs to be seriously addressed.

Next rant, and this will be the last one - I returned to the Little Tokyo area of Downtown Los Angeles, about two blocks from my hotel.   The National Japanese-American Museum was open until 8:00 on Thursday, so I went in.   The majority of the exhibits discussed the mass incarceration, without due process, of about 120,000 Japanese-Americans, most of whom were born in the US, and all of whom, were quite loyal to the US.   President Roosevelt ordered this in early 1942, shortly after Pearl Harbor, despite absolutely no proof that these people were a military threat to our country.   As a matter of fact, the FBI had a report in 1941 from one of their agents who had done the research, that the Japanese-Americans were fine citizens, even disgustingly patriotic.   But, our country does not have a good record of treating others, who look different, very well.   Note that the Army finally allowed a number of these Japanese-Americans to join, forming the 422nd Regimental Combat Team, and sent them to Italy and eventually Germany, where this regiment proceeded to earn more combat medals and suffer higher casualties than any other Army unit.

Japanese-American artist created these from tree limbs and roots while in a "relocation camp"

This painting, by JT Sata is featured in several places.   His drawings, paintings and photos are very haunting.

This barracks/home was disassembled from it's camp location and reassembled in the museum by later generation Japanese-Americans who were trying to achieve some closure to all of this.

It should be noted, me being of German-American ancestry, that there was NO mass incarceration or rounding up of German-Americans.   Yet, unlike the Japanese-Americans, there WERE instances of Germany-Americans landing on the East Coast with the intent to commit espionage and sabotage of American facilities, to include a plan to blow up the Pennsylvania Railroad at the famous Horseshoe Curve.

What bothers me is that I can see the attitude in America right now to blame some group for all of our problems, and expel them, or even execute them!   So far, these extremists cannot make up their minds who they hate the most:  undocumented aliens (my favorite DACA dreamert just graduated from U of Houston), Muslims, LGBTQ, I don't know, almost anyone who is not just like  ......    And there seems to be growing admiration for dictators and even fictional cannibals!    Go figure!

OK, I'm done now.

Another interesting place to visit in Downtown Los Angeles is the "Last Bookstore."    This is probably the largest collection of used books in the country.   Upon asking directions to a few sections, I was advised to go upstairs, through the tunnel of books (quite literally!) and look to my heart's content.   There are all manner of books to include an entire area where old books are organized by COLOR! if you are looking for decorative books.   The lady at the desk did her best to help me find my obscure books, but though she found mention in her computer, she could not find them on the shelves!   I was worried about finding my way back out of there, but I eventually did.    Interesting.   Worth a visit.

This morning, Friday, I managed to make it to the station to catch the 8:13 Amtrak that stopped across the street from Burbank Airport, and easily made it to the plane.   I had a pleasant, if bumpy ride back to Houston.

Burbank-Bob Hope Airport is easy to reach by train from Union Station.   Short, protected walk.

My napkin, on Southwest Airlines.   The airline was born from this drawing on a napkin, over 50 years ago.

While at a cafe in the Airport, I struck up a conversation with two young men at the next table, asking them something about the Los Angeles Angels.   They, in turn, wanted to know about this Houstonian they have heard about - Mattress Mack!    The man is known everywhere!   These guys were on their way to Vegas for a Bachelor Party.   I wished the groom luck and offered him two words to keep his marriage strong:  "YES DEAR!"   He wrote them down!

While waiting for my plane I noticed the video the middle schooler was watching next to me.   CAT VIDEOS!    They really do exist!

So, I am home, my first load of laundry is ready for the dryer, and all three bags have been unpacked!     ...... Wait, the second load has been started.

Let me load these pictures and I will say Good Night.    There is a pillow in the next room, calling my name.

I hope that my next adventure will be in early October, to New England and a number of presidential sites, museums, homes and even a few railroad attractions.  

By the way, I am certain that my misuse of capitalization will drive an owner of the MLA Style Manual crazy!   Keep in mind, I am not writing this for a grade!

1

N

The Getty Center

 I know, you are going to tell me I live in a different world. . . . ., but that's OK, because they know me there!    I am in Los Angeles, Day Three.   I came specifically to visit the Nixon and Reagan Libraries, and to ride on Amtrak.  I met my goals, so now I am just wandering.

I came across some notes last week about transportation that might not be on the maps.   I posted a picture of the Angel Flight Funicular the other night.   Well, there is a people mover here in LA that floats on air like a hovercraft.   It runs between the parking garage and the Getty Center, basically one hill to another.   A bonus was getting to see a world-class art museum.

I took the Metro E train towards Santa Monica and transferred to the 671 bus at Expo/Sepulveda.   Along the way, we passed the LA Colessium, USC, and UCLA.   Also rode past Bel Air (not Bellaire!) and saw that gas in LA is about $4.50 a gallon!  Got off the bus, walked under the 405 and entered a very long queue in the parking lot to pass through security and wait for the people mover.   The tram looks like a baby BART (San Francisco's subway).   The tram rides on air, but was still a little bumpy in spots.  Note: parking is $25.00.    Entrance to the Getty is FREE.

You don't even need to come for the ART.    The tram ride is what us little kids remember!   And the buildings, all in imported travertine, are simply magnificent.   Everything is spacious, and the buildings link to each other.   And then, there is the view!   Hill top.   I could see in all directions, though this was a hazy day.   

The nice lady at the information desk helped me get my bearings, and I was off.    First stop was a rotating exhibit "On Thin Ice; Dutch Depictions of Extreme Weather."  The early 1600s saw some of the coldest winters on record in Holland, and the Dutch produced a lot of paintings and drawings to commemorate these years.   Saw some impressionists, lots of portraits, and my favorite room full of stained glass windows that were beautifully back-lit.   I was so taken by this that I broke down and spent $55.00 on a neck tie depicting the stained glass.   You've seen me, I have NEVER spent that much money on clothes in my life!   But this should go with all of my dress shirts!

I did not linger, my ADHD was acting up, and sometimes the crowds really encouraged me to move on.   But it was a nice visit.   

The Getty Center is an example of what people can do with their money.   In 1957, J. Paul Getty (Getty Oil) was named the richest man in the world.   When he died some years later, he left the bulk of his estate to fund this magnificent public display of art.  Wow!

Security is everywhere at the Getty.   They are nice enough, but they won't let you break rules like drinks in the exhibit hall, or defacing the art.    Someone did something in the main courtyard while I was in the gift shop, and they locked the whole place down for a few minutes.    A staffer told me this happens a lot.   Often it's someone going through the wrong door, which, by the way, I did at the Reagan Library on Monday!

Did I mention the view?

At the Getty, the languages of the day seemed to be Japanese and Italian.    I heard a lot of both.   My presence raised the average age by a good 20 years!    Lots of teens and college students.

On the way back to the hotel, I got off at Little Tokyo station, hoping to visit the museum to Japanese-Americans, but they had had a power outage.   Walked along several blocks of little ramen and sushi cafes.  And lots of  nods to Shohei Ohtani.   I may head back there for dinner.   It's just a few blocks from my hotel.

And finally, a sidewalk sign that reminded me of Susie.

I'm done.   My pictures loaded the first time, which is the first time for that, and so it's time to go have some ramen.  Really not sure what tomorrow will bring, but I am having fun!