Heartland flyer trip sucked.

[mr ed]

Read the various threads about the Heartland flyer trips to Ft. Worth and decided to take the wife and kids.
Left Norman wed morning 7/25 and started out fine.
Once the train got moving though all you saw was a blur of green.
Was expecting a nice scenic view but that didn't happen. Most people on here describing the view must have went in the winter when there was no leaves.
Got to Ft. Worth and was amazed that the downtown was so run down and empty.
Everybody must work in the suburbs now.
Went to the Stockyards and met more disappointment. A lot of the museums and other attractions were closed for remodeling.
Good food was had at Riskeys at a fair price. (ate there twice)
For the most part the stockyards has evolved into bars and tattoo parlors.

Thursday evening we boarded the flyer for the trip home.
All was well til Ardmore where we suddenly stopped. and had a 4 hour wait while they supposedly replaced a section of track.
This put us into Norman after midnight and ruined our dinner plans.

So, if anybody is planning a trip on the Heartland Flyer I would wait at least 6 months til there's no leaves and maybe 18 months til they get the remodeling done.

 

[druryj]

That sucks man. We went a while back and had an uneventful trip. It was something we wanted to do, and did, but it wasn't the "experience of a lifetime" at all. But then, no delays, and no real issues.

 

[TerryMiller]

Oddly enough, I like trains, but for the most part, I don't want to ride them. It's kind of like flying, which has one at 30,000 feet and unable to see the sights I want to see and unable to stop as I like to take pictures. As for train rides, this is my kind of ride.

 

[John6185]

I hate those "delays" on Amtrak as a whole. The train is never on time regardless of the schedule. Of all countries that I see on TV, India and South America have a worse train system but we're not far behind. Our transit system is sorely lacking in comparison to Europe, China etc.

 

[druryj]

Oddly enough, I like trains, but for the most part, I don't want to ride them. It's kind of like flying, which has one at 30,000 feet and unable to see the sights I want to see and unable to stop as I like to take pictures. As for train rides, this is my kind of ride.

Where is this? Do you have details on this train; the name of the route or anything?

 

[TerryMiller]

Durango to Silverton, Colorado - Denver and Rio Grande, I think. Excursion train out of Durango on which one can ride the train to Silverton and return by either bus or ride the train back.

Being the photographer, I chose to ride the train both up and back so I had morning light going up and afternoon light coming back. The trip up, I took more than 800 photos, enough so that I had to find a store to buy an additional memory card and then cut back on the "quality" of the images I was taking by reducing the file sizes.

Those photos are at my Smugmug site under the folder named for Colorado and sub folder for "Vacation 2009." Or, use this link:

Durango to Silverton Steam Train Excursion

This excursion may be less beautiful as I think there were some wildfires this summer that were north of Durango. I don't know if those fires have hampered or stopped the trains.

 

[cjjtulsa]

The Durango ride is excellent; we went in the spring, so it doesn't go all the way to Silverton, but does stop to let you eat and unwind, then reverses direction back to Durango. Had enough snow on the ground when we went last year for the boys (and many adults) to have snowball fights, and for some great pics to be taken. Looks like the steam locomotives are on hold right now due to fires there.

 

[NightShade]

I don't know about the heartland flyer but the route from Omaha to Sacramento was really cool. Donner Pass, Moffet Tunnel going through the mountains. It was really cool but was a winter time trip.

I would love to take my wife along on the ride one time. The bad thing is with her being in a power chair it's not as enjoyable to make the trip since she would be stuck on the lower level and basically in only one car for the entire trip.

 

[n423]

We also had a great trip on HF to Ft Worth. It was several years ago but had no delays. Want to take grandkids...


great pics Terry!!

 

[CoronaBorealis]

My family took the Heartland Flyer to Ft Worth in May and continued on the Texas Eagle to see family in San Antonio. We didn't have any problems on the HF -- the scenery at times wasn't the greatest, but that's not Amtrak's fault. We thought the cars were well maintained and the ride was smooth.

Texas Eagle to San Antonio we were in a sleeper car since we had our little girl and thought it would give her more wiggle room and a place to take her mid-day nap. There were multiple delays, but we were told it was because Amtrak has to always give way to the freight trains since the freight companies are the ones who own the track and have priority. If you were to take an Amtrak through Colorado or Montana, I'm sure the view would have been much more pleasant. The Texas Eagle actually had a view car that had huge windows you could sit and watch the world go by.

As Nightshade was saying, the train from Chicago to San Francisco could be a vacation in itself. If you take a long distance train, I highly recommend a sleeper car since the meals are included in the price of the ticket. Otherwise the meal prices on board are very high.