Well I spent last night at Jon's house on the Cape. I only got a few hours of sleep after talking with my friend from JAX until 1:30. The alarm went off at 5:30, I got up at 5:45 took a shower, and got my things together for the trip home. Jon's father drove us down to the bus station in Hyannis, we made it just in time, bought tickets from the driver and were on our way to South Station. It took about two hours, I was able to catch a little shut eye, but not much. We arrived at South Station, walked down to the Amtrak Ticket counter, picked up Jon's Downeaster tickets and our tickets for BOS-MIA. We went outside to check my two bags; thankfully 67 offers checked bags to connect with 91. With my bags checked in we headed for the Red Line to Park Street where we switched to Green Line. We arrived at North Station about 10 minutes early, where we waited for the boarding of 681. We headed out to the train and sat in one of the three Capstone coaches. The consist was as follows:
P-42 Locomotive 106
Amfleet I Coach 82537-Capstone
Amfleet I Coach 82532-Capstone
Amfleet I Coach 82528-Capstone
Amfleet I Cafe/Business Class 48170
-Blue Triangle Fabric
F-40 Cabbage 90214
(Note: 106 led 681 90214 led 684)
We had a pretty good run to Portland, a few minutes late due to heat restrictions at the end of the trip. We went into the station at Portland, sat, and waited. We boarded the same trainset for the trip back to Boston, but were in Business Class this time. We sat at the bulkhead pair of seats, since one row was broken (footrest and recline). We ate lunch, which had better food than the rest of the system thanks to the Contractor providing food service. A word on that, I personally think it's not right for the Contractor to staff that train, they're using non-Union employees as far as I know, and it's just not fair to the Union guys who staff the rest of the system. At any rate I had two sodas thanks to the Business Class, and when I went back to get a bottle of water I was charged. Last time I checked being in Business Class entitled you to COMPLIMENTARY beverages, and he was really snippy about it. Regardless, we arrived in Boston about 35 minutes late due to the heat restrictions. We took a Green Line train down to the Prudential Center where I picked up a cell phone charger since I couldn't find mine (can never hurt to have two), we ate, and hung out before heading back to South Station.
We checked into ClubAcela since we were connecting first class customers. We were the only two in the lounge, we settled in, watched some TV, drank some soda, etc. The big disappointment to me though was the lack of Wi-Fi, although the attendant said it should be coming in December or so. About 9:30 we headed out to the train, boarded and sat down in the first coach. I went and walked the train for consist, and as I did I noticed the Business Class had the new leather seats. I went back and talked it over with Jon, we decided to go for the upgrade since it was only $24/each and it would be much more comfortable than coach. We moved up to Business Class, and took a pair of seats towards the rear of Business Class. We tried to pull from South Station on time, but I think the cab signal dropped on the Engineer. Our consist was as follows:
AEM-7AC Locomotive 918
Heritage Baggage 1735
Amfleet I Cafe/Business Class 20174
-Leather Seats
Amfleet I Coach 82529
Amfleet I Coach 44243
Amfleet I Coach 82038
As we went along Jon and I both got extremely frustrated with the lady behind us who had obviously been drinking. She was on her cell phone til 12 AM while Jon tried to watch a movie and I tried to get some shut eye. Even after politely asking her to move or end her call we had no luck for the most part, she moved for about 5 minutes until someone else complained. But I am sorry, when it's 11:30 on a night train in Business Class where people are trying to sleep, you'd think she'd be a little more considerate, but apparently not.
Continued in next section
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