Wednesday, August 16, 2017

Riding The Rails

Well, let’s start with last night’s sleep. For me, it was lovely. It was very bumpy and loud. At several points I thought perhaps we had run over something just by the bumps and loud sounds. But apparently we hadn’t, as we kept going. I felt several times that I was going to get tossed out of bed, but since there is only about maybe two inches between the side of the bed and the door, I felt pretty safe. I went to sleep, woke up a couple of times, and went back to sleep. The rocking was similar to a bumpy cruise or turbulent air flight, so it wasn’t too awful for me. When I went to breakfast this morning, one of the wait staff said that another worker told her that it was bumpier than usual.

Anyhoo, back to last night. I was so tired by the time I got settled in my room (settled meaning me and my stuff was in the room and the porter type dude had finished saying whatever he needed to); I just wanted to lie in the bed. Here’s how my “arrangement” went: my backpack suitcase went between the toilet and the chair. When the bed is put down, the bed goes over said suitcase and said toilet. My lovely Disney tote bag was placed up in the storage thingy above said toilet. I managed to locate my contact lens supplies and take care of my eyes and pretty much was ready to call it a night. No, I was not going to shower. Nor was I going to change clothes. My daytime clothes had morphed into my nighttime clothes.

I got into bed. Mind you, with the bed down and my pocket door closed, I have just barely enough space to wedge my chubby lower torso between them without getting stuck. This will be an important thing to know in a few minutes. In fact, when I put my bed down, I was standing in the doorway. Keep that in mind. And since the bed sits on top of the toilet, it’s a little higher than your average bed. And once your bed is down, you can close your door and latch it.

Anyhow, I lay in my bed, looking out the window, waiting for sleep to arrive. You know when you’re so tired that you can’t go to sleep? That’s kinda where I was. The train started moving and bumping and making loud noises, so I decided to read a bit. Finally I got sleepy and went to sleep.

About an hour later (I know this because I looked at my watch and was extremely disappointed to see that it was 11:30pm) I woke up. My legs were a bit achy and I was questioning whether I needed to go to the bathroom. However, this was going to cause an international incident, because (a) my meds were probably in my backpack suitcase that was under the bed, and (b) the toilet was also under the bed. Yes, there is a community toilet down the hall, but I wasn’t exactly sure where it was at that point, and I really didn’t feel like searching it out. Besides, the jury was still out as to whether I really needed to pee or not.

Anyhoo, I did want some Tylenol. So I decided to attempt to put the bed up. But I had closed and locked my door and really didn’t want to open it back up and attract interest to me and my 24-hour old clothes. So I attempted to open it myself. And yes, I did this by wedging my lower torso between the bed and the door. I undid the latch that keeps the bed down and attempted to hoist the bed up. No movement. I continued to try a couple more times, but no movement. So I decided my achy legs and my possible wetting of the bed could wait. And so I did. For about 15 minutes. At which time I decided neither of those situations could wait, so I re-wedged and unlatched the bed and tried again. This time, miraculously the bed (and I say miraculously because I know God had a hand in it), the bed went up. I used the toilet (and for those of you who have cruised, those cruise terlets have nothing on these choo-choo terlets) and then I went in search of some pain meds. Of course, did I remember or exactly know which or where these pills were? Nope, so I rummaged and searched until I found a bottle. Could have been vitamins. Could have been gummy bears. Didn’t care. Just took two, pulled the bed back down, and called it a night. I woke up a couple more times, but went back to sleep without further incident.

Upon waking this morning, I decided to get some breakfast. I was assigned lunch and dinner times, but breakfast is “go between 6:30 and 8:30.” Not exactly knowing where the dining car was, I headed in that direction. It’s several cars from mine, and first you go through the dome car. When I entered the dome car, there was some juice and pastries sitting around. At first I thought perhaps it was a “continental breakfast” but I decided not, and pressed on to the next car which was the dining car. I ended up sitting with a couple and a retired dude, all from Australia (different parts). We had a chatty breakfast (I had an omelet) and then we parted ways.

The train hummed along until lunch, and I went at my assigned time. This time I sat with three other ladies, all travelling along. One was a Brit, one was a Canadian, and one was a Chicagoan who was a very loud talker and sounded like Gladys Kravits from Bewitched. So far, the food has been very good – I had an omelet for breakfast and a quinoa salad for lunch, and they were delish. We ate and parted ways, and the train kept going until we stopped for about an hour at a little spot known as Hornepayne. Everyone got off the train. People who are not in the sleeper class (and some who are) headed to the grocery store to get food and sundries. Everyone walked around a bit, breathed in fresh air, and took photos of the train.

We all boarded our train and we took off. Eventually dinnertime arrived, and I had dinner with my lady lunch pals. I had cod and rice, which was absolutely delicious. Gladys was still loud and it was becoming obvious that she kinda had a negativity about her. We continued to try to converse, and mercifully soon dinner was over and we could part ways. We did find out that everyone changes dinner times each night. Tonight we got dining time #2, and tomorrow night we will have dinner time #3 – the last dinner time – at 9:15pm. Needless to say, Gladys was not happy about that!

It was time for bed, so I pulled down my bed and crawled on. I watched the word go past for a bit, read a bit, and was soon fast asleep. Good night!!

And now for today's photos ...

Some of the woods and water that we pass - so beautiful!

A place we passed - didn't stop.

We stopped and could get out - this is looking way down at the front of the train.

And this is looking way down at the back of the train.

This is my "car" - Bliss Manor.
My roomette is the window to the left of the window with the shade.

This is the "town" where we stopped. It had a grocery store. And a sundries store.

And a emergency department.

This is what you get for meals on the train. Very nice and delicious!!

And these are the engines that pull our train!!
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Blessings today include: delicious omelet breakfast with the Australians; yummy lunch and dinner with my lady diners; watching Canada go past my window; stopping at Hornepayne and seeing the sights; getting photos of the train; texting with family and friends (thanks to Steve’s re-doing of our cell phone plan)

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