Monday, 29 April 2019
Somewhere between Washington DC and Chicago, USA
Late afternoon train departure from Union Station in Washington DC on the overnight sleeper service to Chicago.
Union Station is a nice big architectural building with a grand entrance hall. It’s to be an 18hr overnight journey to Chicago.
Depart Washington DC on time and soon leave the suburbs behind trundling through dense lush green forests, loosely following the Potomac River through Maryland and Pennsylvania. At Martinsburg station, in Pennsylvania, a large group of Amish board.
Cabin is ensuite but you’d struggle to swing a cat in the combined shower and toilet cubicle. Thing aircraft sized toilet but with a shower and you’ll understand why I forego a shower on this occasion.
Like trying to have a shower in a coffin.
A minute washhand basin in the cabin completes the facilities. The sofa converts to quite a wide bed at night with just enough leg room to stretch out.
Dinner is served. Have opted for the tasty sounding Beef Provencal but I suspect it’s never been anywhere near France. It’s a microwave job and the superheated steam nearly spot welds my tongue to cheek.
Cabin is converted to a bed whilst having dinner and find that as the bed is quite wide there’s even less room to walk.
Plenty of squeaks and vibrations.
Manage to resolve the toilet door flying open every five minutes, because the latch vibrates open, with a bit of masking tape I’d bought and wrapped around a container when in Guayaquil, Ecuador, on the advice of an old friend (you know who you are!), and kept in my bag for such eventualities.
It’s 0300hrs when another squeak is rectified by bunging a towel between the top bunk (stowed at an angle as not in use) and the ceiling tile. Feeling rather chuffed with myself that I’ve sorted the squeak out try and get to sleep.
Having.
Not.
Had.
Any.
Yet.
Grrr.
But then after a few minutes as I’ve got back into bed and made myself as uncomfortable as possible, a vibration starts in the ceiling.
Sod it.
Get up again.
Seeing that I’ve bunged the towel up tight against the ceiling near the ventilation grille, this has lifted the ceiling slightly above the grille which now has space to vibrate. Issue resolved by moving towel away from grilles.
Get back in to back and try and sleep.
But then I need a pee.
By now it’s 0330hrs and not had any sleep yet.
But I’ve gaffer taped the toilet door shut so end up with gluey sticky mess on my fingers as I…well…you know what.
And to compound matters. For some inexplicable reason. The toilet light won’t come on.
So I’m shooting in the dark.
Back into bed.
Somehow.
In the early hours.
Manage to grab a disturbed couple of hours of light snooze.
Can’t wait for the next two nights on the rails.
