Journey on the Rails

For anyone who hasn't heard from my children, we're on spring break this week. AND (more importantly) we're taking a vacation. It's trip that's been a loooong time in the making. Aidan, for those who don't know, is train obsessed. We'd batted around the idea of taking a "real" train trip for a long time, but didn't have a real plan in mind. When our friend Father Paul started his canon law work several years ago at the Catholic University in Washington, D.C., he mentioned taking the train himself and suggested we come visit him sometime. We'd kind of played around with the idea, but never made definite plans until Christmas time, when Paul pointed out to us that he was graduating in May and the offer of a place to stay was time limited. I was worried about the cost, but apparently everything in Washington DC (museums, etc.) are free. So, we booked Amtrak tickets and away we went. I'm not sure who was more excited, the kids or Tony and I. We've had the opportunity to do lots of fabulous traveling just through sheer blessings - Hawaii, Italy, Disney World - but this is the first real trip Tony and I have ever taken the kids on by ourselves. I must say, I appreciate the traveling I did with my parents in the wee morning hours much more now!
I had parent teacher conferences Thursday evening, and we were off on Friday as a start to spring break. The train we booked left out of Cincinnati at 3:30 am Friday. So, Thursday evening I packed everything. We put the kids to bed, bathed, at 7:00 and got them back up about 11:45. We were on the road by midnight. They fell asleep in the car, but of course woke up at 1:30 in Cincy raring to go. Cincinnati's Union Station is a gorgeous building and it was very exciting to arrive there in the middle of the night!
Although they've maintained the building as a museum center, tons of the old artifacts remain.
We were a little early, so the guy at the ticket counter nicely entertained my children with hats and coloring books. I'm posting this while Tony is out of the room, and I can't for the life of me figure out how to rotate the pictures on his new computer for work. But they're some of my favorites, so turn your head sideways and deal with it.
Here are Tony and I in the Amtrak terminal - already looking rough!
Union Station in Cincy may look fancy, but to board the train we went out some steps and stood in the dark on what looked like a freight platform. I was a little concerned about what this meant about the quality of our trip, but it excited the kids to be right there when the train came down the tracks. Heck, it excited me too!
We boarded and got settled in right away. The seats in coach are spacious with tons of leg room. The boys sat together, Sophie and I sat together, and Tony sat in a single seat.
We tried sleeping from about 3:30 to 7:00. The boys and Tony were fairly successful. Sophie and I, not so much. Around 7:00, we stopped to pick up more passengers and they starting turning on lights. We had packed breakfast food, so we had a little picnic and Tony walked to the cafe car for coffee. Once the boys were up and at 'em, this is what I saw a lot of:
Sophie, meanwhile, needed constant entertainment. Of course, I had to provide it.
Here we are, looking rougher by the hour!
Me and the boys peeking over Daddy's seat. Once nice thing about the train - no fasten seatbelt signs. You were free to move about as you pleased.
This was our favorite conductor. They switched off on each leg of the journey like a stewardess might. Again, I love the picture so turn your head.
The boys started screaming for lunch about 9:00 am. We finally convinced them to wait until about 11:00, and then we went to the cafe car to eat. The options were limited - the only thing we Catholics could order on a Friday in Lent was the cheese pizza.
And, look at my face now. I'm aging with each minute. This was about 8 hours into the train ride, almost 12 since we'd left the house.
After lunch, I fought with Sophie a little but finally managed to get everyone to take a nap. Even though the seats reclined and had footrests, the boys managed to nod off like this:
Sophie was out cold for about three hours. Very uncomfortably. On my lap. Didn't matter that we had two whole seats to ourselves - she needed to sit on me. I still managed to sleep a little myself. Sleeping on the train is like being in a giant rocking chair. It was great!
We finally arrived at Union Station in Washington DC at about 6:20. Fr. Paul was waiting for us and helped us navigate the Metro to the house were he lives on campus. We have a very nice guest suite with a bed Tony and I will share with Sophie and a smaller bed the boys are sharing. He ordered pizza while we threw the kids into the bath, and then we ate dinner.
The boys didn't want to go to sleep, but it took them all of two minutes to be out like lights. I'm next! Tony's hanging out smoking cigars on the patio with the priests, and I'm falling over I'm so tired. I think I'll be tucking myself in next to Sophie and...