USA & Canada in 2002

One of our trips that comes up a lot in both conversation and on Mastodon is the six week trip we made for our 25th Wedding Anniversary in September 2002. I'll give you a description of it here.

The whole idea was born out of a journey I made through work a year or so before. I'd been sent on a training course to Dallas in Texas, and I'd agreed to go a week early and to make my own way from New York to Dallas by train. The training provider paid for all the flights, I paid for the train (and a hire car in Dallas). I considered this for our anniversary holiday, but frankly - there's not a lot to see or do in Dallas, so the trip morphed, bent and twisted and became the six week adventure that I'll describe.

You need to remember that in 2002 that the internet wasn't the internet we know today. It was a 'new thing' and we weren't used to trusting it in the way we do now to make travel plans. But I did!

We left home early one morning and travelled by coach to Heathrow in a snowstorm (yes, September!) - the coach ticket was the only paper confirmation I had with me.

From Heathrow we flew with United - who gave us a bottle of champagne as it was our 25th anniversary - to New York.

In New York we stayed in a curious hotel just off Times Square which had a rooftop swimming pool - Sacha could lie in there looking at the New York skyline! We went to a show on Broadway and walked through Central Park. We visited Ellis Island and did all sorts of tourist things. I'm not a city person, and didn't enjoy the place as much as Sacha who would return at the drop of a hat.

From New York it was the plan to get the train to Chicago - travelling trhough New England during the afternoon to see the autumn colours of the trees. Amtrak had other ideas! The train was five hours leaving Penn Station - and once we were in the tunnel the power dropped out leaving the train in darkness. There was a passenger having a panic attack - you need to remember that the Twin Towers attack was still a raw memory for Americans back then. So - we went through New England in the dark, and never saw the trees.

We did arrive in Chicago pretty much on time, which I consider somewhat miraculous. Chicago gave us a bit of sightseeing - we went up the Sears Tower and went to the lakeside pier.

From Chicago we took the Amtrak Empire Builder service all the way across to Seattle which was a journey of about 2 days. We had a very comfortable sleeper compartment and eat Amtrak's very acceptable food which we crossed through amazing scenery.

My memories of Seattle (and Vancouver) are hazy - so forgive me for lack of detail here.

We travelled by coach - it may have been an Amtrak service - across the Canadian border to Vancouver. Crossing the border was an unpleasant experience - the Canadian border guards were being very vigilant about stopping American citizens with criminal records from entering Canada - fair enough - but the unpleasantness was extreme. I don't know if it's thawed any these days.

Again, I have few memories of Vancouver, except going for a tour around one of the parks and seeing the native totem poles and having their symbolism explained.

From Vancouver we were taking the ViaRail Canadian service across the country. The send off from Vancouver station included a band and much ceremony. We were in the 'luxury' end of this enormous train. The front part is for 'passengers' - economy class; the rear was for 'tourists' and first class, including an observation dome car. The food on this 5 day trip was amazing - well prepared and superbly served. We go to know a couple who we shared a table with - they were Canadian Mounties in the drugs squad. The scenery was jaw dropping, and the train slowed to allow passengers to get the best of it.

Toronto wasn't the highlight of the trip! I left my credit card in an ATM machine, we had a bit of a disagreement (hardly surprising being cooped up in a train for 5 days), and I misjudged the distance between our hotel and the car hire pick up place - no it wasn't walkable!

We did a bit of sightseeing using our hired car, but I found Toronto city traffic frightening - the concept of 'stopping distance' between cars didn't seem to exist, and the speeds were far too high for me.

The purpose of the hire car was to reach Niagra Falls a roughly 2 hour drive away. Niagara lived up to all our expectations and we did the usual tourist things and had a great time.

From Niagara the plan was to fly back to New York from Buffalo. Honestly - I have no idea now how we got to the airport. I do remember that there was some talk of bumping us off the booked flight - which would have completely fouled up all our onward plans. In the end we did fly as expected, but it was an unpleasant experience.

Back in New York for a couple of day to regather our strength before flying back home, and back to some sort of reality.

We had a really memorable time - we enjoyed (almost) every minute. But we've never been back to North America since.

If you want to see our photos (and see us when we were young and I had hair) there's a Google Photos album - (Ignore the 2013 date on the album it's a Google thing - not me!)