Houston - LA - Bakersfield - Stockton - Sacramento - Seattle

Our USA train experience went OK. We were in a sleeper car so we did get to sleep horizontally instead of sitting up Greyhound-style. They also gave us free food - or at least food included in the price - of which we were previously unaware - so that was a nice surprise. We did have a bit of an issue with our tickets though. They somehow got recycled at the Thompson's house (well they disappeared after the recycling was taken out anyway) and therefore didn't have any tickets when we turned up. The Amtrak guy was unsympathetic when we (white lie) told him that the tickets never showed up (we blamed the US postal service!) and expected us to buy a brand new set of tickets ($600+ eek!). Luckily we managed to convince him that the tickets had been lost so he (grudgingly) re-issued them - phew! Despite being on time right the way up to Sacramento, we were over 6 hours late into Seattle so we arrived at 3am. Bart and Lauren heroically picked us up so we didn't have to make our own way - luckily Lauren doesn't have to work today so it worked out alright.



So we have to get all all our Xmas shopping done in the next few days - may have to sharpen the elbows tonight. I'll report later on the state of shopping malls in Seattle a week before Christmas.

Hattrick news: 3-0 win this weekend. Currently rated 1284 in Scotland.

I was thinking of totalling up our total miles so far - Edinburgh - Seattle. I'll get to work on that for next post.

There have been some comments issues - hopefully these are now behind us. I believe it was a blogger issue but it should be OK now.