Made It To Chicago

[kevin_standlee]

Our train arrived in Chicago at 11:45 PM, just short of nine hours late. Lisa and I walked to the Holiday Inn (although I think it might not be officially a legal sidewalk we used), and I'm pretty sure we were checked in and in our hotel room long before most of the people with missed connections at Chicago had been processed.

Per my previous post, it's just as well I wasn't angling for a hotel room and a trip tomorrow. All of the people who missed connections to the Michigan Service trains are riding buses to their final destinations, poor folks. I'm better off at the hotel, even though it's strange.

The hotel room we have is crazy. It's actually a ten-person conference room with a board room style table with an attached bedroom. We don't actually like it, but it was the only room left. I must get a picture before we leave. We requested a 2 PM check out so we can sleep in tomorrow, which we need desperately.

My smartphone froze up shortly after my previous post, and I didn't know how to reset it. (Hold Power + Volume Down for ten seconds; but I couldn't find that out until I was back at an internet connection that does not depend upon the smartphone.)

Longer report later, maybe, if I have the energy. Now I must try go get some sleep. We're still happy we took the train, even though the schedule was mucked up.

Comments

[howeird]

Agreemessage. We who know and love Amtrak take it knowing we're cannot be in a hurry. My only time being on the wrong side of that was when I took the Coast Starlight to Portland, with a car reservation waiting, because the 4-hour final leg of the train ride is a 2-hour drive. The train was so late it terminated in Portland, well after Hertz had closed, and since I did not have a through ticket they would not put me up in the hotel with the others.

However, I wrote to Amtrak, and suggested that their lateness cost me both a day's car rental and a hotel stay, and they refunded me the hotel costs.