Amtraking to Santa Fe

I left San Diego on another train which took me up to Los Angles along the coast.  It was a lovely run, saw some lovely beaches, and amazing stations. 

Once in Los Angles I had to get from one track to the next one to get my next train to Lamy, New Mexico.  Unusually there was an actual tunnel under the track.  Usually you just have to walk across the tracks which I find a bit strange because you have to watch for trains all the time.  

Since the journey was going to take just under a day I booked a roomette.  I’m glad I did but this was one occasion when British Rail does it better.  

My roomette had two seats which made down into a bed at night.  If two folk had been in it I think we would have been playing “kneesy” for a good part of the journey. When the bed was made up and I lay down I would say from wall to wall was probably about 5 and half feet across.  Anyone over 6 feet couldn’t have stretched out.  The second bunk was above my head. Since the edge of the bed was 6 inches at the most from the door I don’t think I would have liked it all if there had been two of us. It was dark by the time  we left the outskirts of Los Angles so I didn’t really see any of the scenery until the next morning.  As a sleeping car passenger I had dinner, breakfast and lunch on the train as it was part of the ticket.

Seats were allocated in the dining car so I met different people at each sitting.  We talked about the election, my trip, class reunions, the scenery, which was mostly desert but very colourful. All in all it was a very pleasant journey.  Then we arrived in Lamy.  The scenes where you see a station in the middle of nowhere exactly describes Lamy.  From there there was a shuttle to take me into Santa Fe.

Santa Fe is very different to other towns that I have been in.  It is almost exclusively built in the Pueblo Indian style with input from the Spanish-Mexican empire. Generally the houses are built of adobe brick often with a hacienda. 

Santa Fe is one of the oldest towns in America.  Some parts of it date from the early 1600s.  It was built round  a village square, bordered on one side by the Palace of the Governors and shops around the other sides.  

In Santa Fe when you get married you then parade through the town to your reception.

I’d like to say that I had a wonderful time in Santa Fe but I didn’t, it was the lowest point of this trip.  In fact it’s the only low point I’ve had.  I won’t go into what happened here.  Some of you know what happened and those who don’t can hear about it later.