2017 - MinnWisMi - Home Sweet Home

Thursday, October 19 - Empire Builder to Seattle to Sweet Home
Well....Amtrak was right......most of us were awake around 5:30 Pacific time this morning because the bodies thought it was 6:30 Mountain time or, more likely, 7:30 Central time. We were at breakfast by 6:00 and shared it with a couple from Port Angeles that are also on their way home. We are somewhere west of Leavenworth, Washington as the sun comes up.

One of the first things we noticed was the intensity of the fall colors here in the Northwest. This was true for the rest of the day.......some of the best we have ever seen here.

We are really enjoying the mountain scenery but are glad we aren't riding in this rain.

Skykomish

The South Fork of the Skykomish River. It looks like it has been getting a lot of rain lately.

Puget Sound is gray from clouds this time. When we were here in early August, it was gray from smoke. This is much better.

We arrived in Seattle 20 minutes early!

We retrieved our two checked bags and are getting ready to brave the Seattle traffic.

Cindy, Donna's walking partner in Minot, is on her way to meet her 1st grandchild in Bellingham. She was so excited to be almost there.

We donned all our rain gear and headed up 4th Ave. towards the Budget Car Rental place. We want to get home by this evening because Donna has a meeting tomorrow morning. The Amtrak Cascades would get us to Albany after dark and too late to ride our bikes back to Sweet Home.

It was only a mile but it took awhile between traffic lights and an ambulance running full lights and sirens.

The amazing thing was that it didn't rain one drop until we reached our destination.

The van we rented had seats that folded into the floor so it was totally flat, perfect for the bikes.

It poured rain the rest of the day. It always feels a little weird to be in a car in the middle of traffic after all those weeks on the bikes. We made it home without incident and returned the rental car to Eugene after dropping off the bikes at home. It was a wonderful trip for us but it is really good to be back home too. We hope that you have enjoyed the journey too!

We rode at least a mile in 7 states
Total miles = 1,361
52 days on the road that includes:
38 days on the bikes, 5 days off the bikes for weather and other stuff, 3 days with family, and 6 days on the train.
AND LOTS OF ICE CREAM!

Map 1
Fargo, North Dakota to St. Paul, Minnesota

Map 2
St. Paul, Minnesota to Manitowoc, Wisconsin

Map 3
Ludington, Michigan to Grosse Ile, Michigan

Map 4
Toledo, Ohio to Seattle Washington by train

Map 5
Our route  is covered in blue (snow) on November 3rd, 2 weeks after we  returned  home. Our timing couldn't have been better!

2017 MinnWisMi - Empire Builder Heading West

Wednesday - October 18 - On the Empire Builder
Minot, North Dakota - sunrise at 8:15 while we were eating breakfast. This stop was long enough that we had about 20 minutes to walk after breakfast. Donna and fellow passenger, Cindy, did their best to get in at least a mile in that time while they talked about biking in Europe. Doug did not try to keep up.

Between Tagus and Blaisdell, North Dakota. There are hundreds of these ponds in this area.

What you can't see is that the wind is blowing at about 25 mph from the west. We don't think the train cares as much about headwinds as we would on the bikes.

Had a chance to talk to our neighbors across the aisle. One woman is from Australia and the other is from England. That's what we love about trains is that you get to meet and talk to so many different people.

This is how we could tell when we crossed state lines.

North Dakota - Montana state line and we are now in the Mountain Time Zone,

Matt and Noel, our lunch mates, have been on the train for a week. They are newlyweds and are getting ready to move from Los Angeles to Chicago. He works on trains as a porter and answered a bunch of questions we had about how things get done on passenger trains.

Nice to see some hills.

Just outside Bainville

The Milk River west of Glasgow

Havre stretch break. We were running 1 1/2 hours late so it wasn't as long as scheduled. It was a pleasant afternoon (4:30) and it seemed like everyone got off to get some fresh air. 

"Hands Across the Border"

Lots of selfies were taken in front of this big guy.

Jimmy is our sleeping car porter who took great care of all of us. He might be just a little worried that everyone is going to listen to the "All Board"

Looks like mountains and clouds are in our future.

We did get to see a little bit of a sunset as we were finishing dinner. Kudos to our waiter, Aaron. We hope he is still with us for breakfast after the train splits in Spokane.

No wifi on this train so all we could do for the blog was sort pictures. We are now a week behind, as any of you that have been following us already know. It was pretty dark when we went through Glacier National Park and Whitefish. We gave a long-distance wave to Lori, Cody and Abby in Kalispell as we left the station. We are going to bed in Mountain Time and they just announced that breakfast will be served starting at 5:30 tomorrow morning, which is an hour earlier than this morning. Hmmmm.

2017 - MinnWisMi - Toledo, OH to Chicago, IL

Tuesday, October 17 - Toledo to Chicago
We used our headlamps but the one mile to the train station was well lit.....dry but chilly at 5 am

That's our train.

We are taking the Lakeshore Limited because it has bike racks so we don't have to box the bikes. Thank you Amtrak!! 

We were early but the train was about an hour late due to a frozen switch somewhere in New York.

Ohio

Indiana - Illinois border

Chicago skyline looking down the Chicago River.

Chicago Union Station is really BIG.

There is a bike boulevard right outside the station. We are looking for lunch.

Joyce warned us about leaving our fully-loaded bikes unattended and then offered to watch them while we went inside to order our sandwiches. We really enjoyed chatting with her.

We had an hour to walk around this part of town but not quite enough time to go check out the waterfront where we passed through in 2007. Wow, that was a fast 10 years!

We thought we were in Illinois but this room in the train station was all about autumn in Wisconsin.

Notice that the helmet is unbuckled.

The bike is totally fine. My helmet just started to fall off when I lifted the bike and Doug's timing was impeccable. We came up with lots of funny captions when we saw the picture later.

It is 2:00 in the afternoon. It is dark because the train tracks are below ground.

We left the station right on time - 2:15 pm.

A more colorful side of Chicago

Back in Wisconsin though it doesn't look like the land of silos and big barns that we rode through.

Milwaukee

Milwaukee River not far from Lake Michigan

Boy are we glad we aren't in a car! It looks like a pile of spaghetti on the map.

This is more like it! We are somewhere between Milwaukee and Madison.

You can't see it but this is Mississippi River crossing #25 of this trip and we are back in Minnesota.

Mississippi River crossing #26

Hello St. Paul, wish we had a little more time to visit but we do get a chance to walk outside the train before bedtime.

We will cross the Mississippi River one last time (#27) after we go to bed. It is nice being able to lie down even when it is the top bunk.