8 Days on a Train: A Report on the Western Side of the Tracks

I am back from my cross country train trip!  Let me tell you, it was quite the experience.  Mostly positives, but some negatives along the way.

Traveling across the country by train is one of the most unique experiences of my life.  Nothing quite like seeing that much of America in a few days.  Parts of the train trip were incredibly beautiful.  In particular, the stretch from Emeryville, California to Denver, Colorado were just amazingly picturesque.  On the east bound portion of my trip, we had two docents on board who we picked up around Sacramento and dropped off in Reno, Nevada.  They narrated and talked about the Gold Rush (among other things), because this particular stretch of the tracks was very important during that era.

My recommendation:  if you have never traveled by train before and you are looking for a positive first time experience, pick up the California Zephyr at the beginning of the line (around Emeryville) and take it to Reno, Nevada.  Hop off the train, spend the night (or two!) and explore this historic town before taking the California Zephyr back to your starting destination.  From Emeryville to Reno is about 4 or so hours (if I remember correctly!).






The section through Nevada and Utah was also very interesting and pretty in it's own way.  I am not a huge fan of the desert, but even I can see the beauty in these sparsely populated areas.  What was cool is that I saw some wild horses and pronghorn antelope along the way, among various other wildlife I could not snap a picture of.  I slept through most of this part of the train ride, as it was made during the night, so I was unable to see some of the more unique features of the land.  I woke up around Green River, Utah and was able to see Arches National Park off in the distance.  I visited this park last year and it is AMAZING; I highly recommend a visit to anyone able to go!

 

Wild horses (above)

Pronghorn antelope (above)

My second favorite part of the train ride was the part in Colorado.  In particular the stretch through the Gore Canyon in Colorado is just breathtaking.  Now I want to go back and river raft, like hundreds of people were doing the day I traveled through!  A brief blurb about it on Wikipedia, for those interested, click here.

The last picture on the bottom that looks very sparse is a very dangerous stretch of the road along this canyon.  You can see past cars that have crashed along the steep hillside there.  The train conductor said that a guard rail was added which has drastically cut down on the number of accidents occurring in this area.

During the Colorado portion of the ride, you pass through Moffat Tunnel.  If you're like me, I never knew this was a unique and rare tunnel.  In fact, I had never heard of it before passing through it.  This tunnel is 6.2 miles long, 24 feet high, 18 feet wide, and took Amtrak about 10 minutes or so to pass through it.  It took 48 months to bore through the mountains and complete the tunnel in 1927.  The conductor asks everyone to stay in their seats/car during this part of the ride, as passing through the doors connecting the different train cars can let in a lot of diesel fumes.  They also run fans to try and clear out the air in the tunnel after a train passes through.  The tunnel peaks at 9,239 feet high and crosses the continental divide.  If you take note of which way the water is flowing before you cross, you can see that it does flow the opposite direction once through the tunnel.

This image from Wikipedia shows really well how much time/length was cut off with this new route through the Rockies:

After the portion through the Moffat Tunnel, you have some equally amazing views on the other side of the tunnel.  According to the conductor, you can see about 2/3 of the state from this incredible vantage point the California Zephyr has along the edge of the mountains.

On my eastbound portion of the train ride, I was sitting on the wrong side of the train to get this great view.  So, note to all of you potential California Zephyr train riders!

Where to View and When

NOTE: The sides of the train listed below are for EAST BOUND train travelers unless otherwise noted!

For good views up to Reno, both sides of the train offer excellent views, however the left side might slightly edge out the right when you get closer to Donner Lake.  If you want good views of the Gore Canyon in Colorado, the right side of the train is very good.  The left side also has some good views, but many times you end up looking at cliff face going straight up.  When you exit the Moffat Tunnel, you’ll want to sit on the left side.  This side has the incredible views of Colorado as far as you can see.  After this point, both sides of the train offer fairly decent and unique views.

On the westbound portion of my trip, I made sure I sat on the right side so I’d get the good views of Colorado from high up in the mountains.  I feel like, however, the eastbound train seems to get a better view over all, coming in to Colorado, rather than the westbound train, which is leaving Colorado.

The following pictures are from the westbound portion of my trip through the Colorado region.

 












The trees were just starting to change color, too!  You can see the aspens are very yellow.

Unfortunately, I don't have a whole lot to report on the rest of the trip from Denver onward.  The most notable portions of the train ride after Denver were my layovers in Chicago and Washington, D.C.  I will talk more about the eastern half of the train and share some pictures in a later post.

For now, I hope everyone enjoyed my description and photos of the Western portion of the California Zephyr's route!



(For anyone curious, the camera I used to take these photos were either my Canon D10, a camera I bought mainly for it's underwater use, and my Samsung Galaxy S4 phone).