Rode the ORIGINAL CZ when it was operated by Burlington, D&RGW, and Western Pacific. Wonderful trip. Those Vista Dome cars were a delight. You could look towards the front of the train and play engineer, or you had total view from all sides. I doubt that AMTRAK can replicate it.
Great footage! I grew up at Donner in the summers when The Hill was ALL double tracked. Probably hiked every section of the route while I was in college because my HO layout No. 4 depicted the route from Truckee to Colfax. An old Ca. State Park buddy of mine and I use to go up to Norden and have lunch at the café in the snow sheds. None of those are there now. This video is a keeper. Thanks for the memories! (...if those new locos weren't so damned ugly.)
Once while I was on the CZ riding in a sleeping car, I observed a live birth take place on the train, I’m not joking. Back in late March 2019, I was on the California Zephyr going from Davis to Glenwood Springs and on the train, there was pregnant 19 year old girl from SFSU traveling from Emeryville to Denver with her boyfriend. They normally fly home from college for holidays/breaks but because their due date was close (due date was April 5th and they departed on March 29th), they had to use the train since airlines do not allow women to fly in the last 6 weeks of pregnancy. During the ride at 1 AM, the girl’s water broke and the attendant for our sleeping car (Justin Woods, a young guy in his early 20s) volunteered to deliver the baby since he had seen how it was done online. The girl agreed and Justin did so in which he went into the first aid kit, got his gloves on, then squeezed himself into the roomette to have the girl push while he caught the baby when she was born. The baby ended up being born on the train - a healthy baby girl in a ROOMETTE!!! It was a fabulous story and the girl, her newborn and boyfriend were taken off the train by paramedics at the next railroad crossing (train was in a remote location between Elko and Salt Lake City at the moment which required a helicopter ambulance to meet the train). As it is, I observed the whole thing as I was holding the girl’s left leg as well as recording this with her boyfriend’s phone. I’ve wondered - if you are female, suppose this happened to you where you (or your wife/girlfriend) suddenly went into labor on an Amtrak train and the train was going across a remote location at the moment. Would you at all be able to tolerate giving birth unmediated, while crammed into a Roomette, on a bed that was not flexible (unlike in the hospital), on a train that speeding up to 90 MPH, the baby’s umbilical cord having to stay attached to you until you got to a hospital (no scissors/clamps on the train), and the person delivering your baby is an Amtrak conductor/attendant with no medical training or license of any kind??? Seriously, this girl was incredibly brave and was lucky that there were no complications, PLUS it only took 20 minutes for her to push the baby out (water broke at 1 AM, and the baby was born at 1:22 AM) What do you think of all this!!!???
Very nice compilations my friend. I really enjoyed all the videos. By the by if I come to Delaware state, what is the best part to enjoy train rides and take videos of Amtrak or local trains?
I didn't know baggage cars were supposed to be beautiful. I think the idea is UTILITARIAN to do the job. It appears that when they ordered the new AMFLEET cars, the took the standard body and built a baggage car.
