Trip Itinerary
PRE TOUR CONNECTION
Not included in the price of tour*.
America by Rail will arrange for America from Coast to Coast tour participants from Southern California to travel to Sacramento the day prior to DAY ONE.
Tour participants from Southern California will board the Pacific Surfliner for Los Angeles. Members will board in San Diego (6:10 a.m.), Oceanside (7:01 a.m.), Santa Ana (7:57 a.m.), Anaheim (8:06 a.m.), and Fullerton (8:15 a.m.) and arrive in Los Angeles at 8:50 a.m.
Southern California tour members will board the Coast Starlight for its 10:20 a.m. departure. There is comfortable seating on this double-decker train. You’ll want to go to the glass-walled Sightseer Lounge car for spectacular viewing.
Snacks, sandwiches and beverages are available. Full course lunch and dinner are optional. Additional tour member will join in Santa Barbara (12:48 p.m.), San Luis Obispo (3.43 p.m.) and San Jose (8:27 p.m.). Arrival into Sacramento is scheduled for 11:59 p.m. The Tour Director will greet you and transfer you to your hotel for tonight in Sacramento*.
Day 1: En Route
This morning you will transfer to the Sacramento Amtrak station for the 11:09 a.m. departure of the California Zephyr.
Members from the San Joaquin Valley will board a northbound San Joaquin train in Bakersfield (4:55 a.m.), Fresno (6:50 a.m.), Merced (4:55 a.m.), Modesto (8:28 a.m.), Stockton (9:01 a.m.) and arrive into Sacramento at 9:35 a.m. and board with the rest of the members.
The Zephyr features the double-decker Superliner equipment. Relax in your private Roomette. A shower room and four lavatories are available to Roomette occupants. Bedrooms, with private lavatory and shower, are available at an additional cost.
After settling in, you may want to go to the glass-walled Sightseer Lounge car with its comfortable seats. It is a great place to view the passing scenery. Coffee, juices and bottled water are available in the your sleeping car throughout the day. All meals on the trains are included beginning with a full-course lunch in the dining car.
As you travel eastward, you leave the lush green landscape and palm trees of California and enter the rugged terrain dotted with pine trees of the of the High Sierra Nevada mountains. Pass through the famous Donner Pass this afternoon.
Meal(s): L & D
Day 2: En Route
Make sure you take the opportunity to view the spectacular scenery from the Sightseer Lounge car as we make our way toward Denver. When we leave Glenwood Springs, we will begin to climb through the awesome Rockies toward the Continental Divide. We’ll encounter the famous 6.2-mile long Moffat Tunnel and go under the Continental Divide. The mountain vistas will continue throughout the afternoon. We’ll arrive in Denver at 7:10 p.m.
Meal(s): B, L & D
Day 3: En Route to Chicago
The California Zephyr will roll across Iowa and Illinois and arrive in Chicago at mid afternoon. You’ll spend tonight at Hampton Inn Majestic. Many restaurants are nearby.
Meal(s): B & L
Day 4: Chicago
Enjoy a Continental breakfast in your hotel this morning. You’re free until late this afternoon to enjoy many of the Windy City’s major attractions.
Chicago is a shopper’s fantasyland with Magnificent Mile, an eight-block stretch featuring 460 stores. Navy Pier features 50-acres of parks, promenades, entertainment, restaurants, shops and more. World class museums offer something for everyone: The Museum of Science and Industry, The Field Museum, The Adler Planetarium and Astronomy Museum and The Shedd Aquarium.
At 8:00 p.m. we’ll board the eastbound Lake Shore Limited. A reception will be held in the dining car. Departure is scheduled for 9:30 p.m.
Relax in your included Viewliner Roomette. There are two comfortable reclining seats on either side of an eye-level picture window. At night, your attendant converts the two seats into a lower berth. An upper berth pulls down from the ceiling. There is a 6’ x 18” high window next to the upper berth. The Roomette includes a sink and a commode. A shower room is nearby. Bedrooms are available for an additional cost.
You’re free to explore the train. Go to the lounge car for snacks, sandwiches, and beverages.
Meal(s): CB
Day 5: En Route
During the day our train will roll across beautiful upstate New York. The trip down the Hudson River with the Catskill Mountains in the background is beautiful.
Upon arrival into New York’s Penn Station at 6:35 p.m., we’ll transfer to the San Carlos Hotel for the night.
Meal(s): B & L
Day 6: New York City
Following an included Continental breakfast this morning we’ll embark on a sightseeing tour of New York City. You’ll ride through the most famous uptown and downtown neighborhoods: Harlem, Museum Mile, Central Park, Times Square, the Empire State Building, Greenwich Village, Lincoln Center, Grant’s Tomb, United Nations, St. Patrick’s Cathedral and many more.
At 2:15 p.m., you’ll be departing New York on the New Orleans-bound Crescent. You’ll, again, be enjoying the Viewliner accommodations.
Meal(s): CB & D
Day 7: En Route
We’ll be passing through Atlanta at 8:00 this morning and traveling through Alabama and Mississippi during the day. At 7:30 p.m. we’ll arrive in the fascinating Crescent City. Our hotel, the Hampton Inn, is located near the French Quarter.
An option for this evening would be a Night-Sightseeing tour.
Meal(s): B, L & D
Day 8: New Orleans
A Continental breakfast is included at our hotel this morning. We’ll transfer to the Amtrak station where our travelers will prepare for a 2,000-mile trip across five states to Los Angeles. We’ll travel first-class on the Sunset Limited. Relax in your comfortable private Roomette or Bedroom sleeping accommodations.
Departure is scheduled for 9:00 a.m.
All tastefully prepared full-course dining car meals are included. Lunch will be the first of our six included dining car meals.
After lunch, options include visiting with new friends while watching the famous swampland of Louisiana (known as the Bayou) from the all-glass Sightseer Lounge car. How about a post-lunch nap in your comfortable private-room accommodations? Soon we’ll be passing through the sugar cane fields.
We’ll arrive in Houston shortly after 6:18 p.m. You’ll have about a half-hour to enjoy a train-side stroll.
Meal(s): CB, L & D
Day 9: En Route
During the night the landscape changed drastically. You’re now in the sparsely-populated Rio Grande Valley of West Texas. Tumbleweeds and arid lands surround our train. Just west of Del Rio we’ll cross the Pecos High Bridge spanning a magnificent canyon cut to the Pecos River 321 feet below. Further on we pass by Langtry where Judge Roy Bean enforced his own “law west of the Pecos.” This area was dealt with in the TV Series “Lonesome Dove”.
Plan on a train side stroll during our late afternoon stop in El Paso. That’s Mexico across the narrow Rio Grande River. The rest of the day we’ll encounter the stark, desolate–almost hostile–land of southern New Mexico and Arizona. If you’re still active when we arrive in Tucson at 9:40 p.m., enjoy another walk.
Meal(s): B, L & D
Day 10: En Route / Los Angeles
Palm Springs . . . Ontario . . . Pomona . . . Los Angeles Union Station. Enjoy your final morning on the Sunset Limited. Breakfast will be served as the train rolls along the lush California countryside. Huge clusters of power generating windmills cling to a number of mountainsides.
Arrival into Los Angeles Union Station is scheduled for 5:30 a.m. Travelers returning to Southern California home destinations will depart at 11:10 a.m. on a Pacific Surfliner. Those returning to San Joaquin Valley homes will depart at 10:45 a.m.
San Bernardino participants will travel from Los Angeles to San Bernardino on a Metrolink train.
Passengers bound for Bakersfield and north depart this morning on the San Joaquin service for home destinations.
Passengers bound for the San Diego area will depart on a southbound Surfliner train scheduled to leave at 2:00 p.m. Relax in your comfortable reclining coach seat. Sandwiches, snacks and beverages are available in the nearby cafe car.
Passengers for Ventura, Oxnard, Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo and other Central and Northern California points will depart on the Coast Starlight and will arrive home through the afternoon and evening.
The scenic highlights of the day will be the traversing of a number of mountain ranges and about 100 miles of rolling along the awesome Pacific Ocean coastline. You’ll want to spend time in the Sightseer Lounge car. Arrival into Sacramento is scheduled for 11:59 p. m.
*An additional $75 p.p./d.o.; $150 Single for those requiring a pre-tour night in Sacramento. Call for connecting rail pricing