For four months I've had the bitter taste in my mouth of my last train trip to Florida, which ended prematurely in Jacksonville. I've been determined to complete the northbound trip on Amtrak's Silver Star, particularly because there was one stretch of the route through the Carolinas that I had never seen in the light of day.
Amtrak had given me a full refund from the truncated trip in April, and after I kvetched a little more to them about their customer service they threw in an additional $75 voucher. I'll take it. My birthday seemed like a good time to use the voucher. So I figured I'd fly down to Tampa for the day, then catch the train in the evening back to D.C. I invited my best friend from college, Eric, to join me in a roomette.
I took the 6:30 a.m. flight to Tampa to begin my trip from National Airport. We were a bit delayed in taking off, and touched down around 9:15.
This is where things get fun. Tampa's airport has a series of people movers that connect each of the gate areas with the main terminal.
The blue train, pictured above, took me from the Southwest Airlines gate area to the main terminal. I then picked up the relatively new SkyConnect train, in operation since 2018, which took me to the car rental center building, and adjacent bus stop.
Hillsborough Area Regional Transit (HART) operates a fairly extensive bus network in the area, with two lines connecting the airport and downtown Tampa. Unfortunately each only runs once an hour, with one arriving on the hour and the other on the quarter hour. But still, the fare beats Uber any day.
After about a half-hour ride, I arrived at the main downtown bus station, then walked another 15 minutes to Heights Public Market. The place is amazing. It's full of various ethnic food vendors, has plenty of seats and has a very informal-but-classy vibe to it. Would highly recommend it to anyone visiting Tampa for the first time. I was in the mood for tacos, so that's what I went with for lunch.
I had several hours to kill in the city, so I figured I would walk the length of Tampa's river walk, which runs along the Hillsborough River. It was a beautiful sight to see, despite the heat and humidity.
Across the river, I caught a glimpse of Howard Blake High School, which which still celebrating the recent success of the hometown professional hockey team, the Tampa Bay Lightning-- the 2020 and 2021 Stanley Cup Champions, and this year's runner-up.
Another building that caught my attention initially appeared to be a religious shrine of some sort, but is actually part of the University of Tampa.
I wound my way around to the Channel District, where Amalie Arena (home of the Lightning) is. They're still celebrating the team's recent success, and a stage that had been set up for this year's Stanley Cup Finals was still assembled two months after the fact.
Also near the arena I caught a glimpse of Tampa's restored streetcar, which runs between downtown and the Ybor City neighborhood. If I wasn't exhausted from being out in the heat I might've taken a ride. But I was ready to get indoors and cool off.
I finally made it to Tampa Union Station, at the eastern edge of downtown. It's an attractive building that's more than 100 years old. It has rustic old wooden benches in the waiting area, and an old-timey feel. Having said that, some parts of this station, particularly the restrooms, could use a little TLC.
This is where Eric and I eventually met up, since he had taken an afternoon flight. He suggested I come up with a method for how to measure a train, or a station's quality. I figured a simple 1-10 scale rating would work. Tampa's Union Station comes in at around a 6 I'd say. On the plus side, the station maintains its historic character and scores high for accessibility as one of the few Amtrak stations in the south that has raised platforms that are level with the train. Where the station falls short is in the areas of cleanliness and appearance.
The Silver Star backs into Tampa due to the fact that it is using a spur track that dead-ends at the station (more on that
here). Fortunately the train was only running about 20 minutes late to start, so we got off on the right foot.
The first few minutes of a train ride, I find, are always some of the most exciting. Everything is new and fresh, the same way the first bite of a sandwich or a slice of pizza always seems to be the most flavorful one. But I guess that's just the Law of Diminishing Returns for ya. Anyway, there was something refreshing and welcoming about having an attendant greet us and show us to our roomette for the first time.
Roomettes have two seats facing each other, so you can talk to your neighbor while simultaneously watching the scenery roll by. The rooms aren't huge, but there's enough room to store small luggage items. There are also convenient amenities such as electrical outlets, reading lights and a sink that folds down from the wall.
Eric and I rode in one of the new Viewliner II sleeping cars, which entered service about six years ago. These cars are much newer than the old ones, which are about 25 years old.
At 7 p.m. we made our way to the dining car, one car up. I had the salmon and rice entrée, which came with a salad, roll, and vanilla mini cake. Amtrak also gives sleeping car passengers one free glass of wine per trip.
Amtrak used to offer white tablecloth dining service for all passengers on all long-distance trains. Since the start of the pandemic, they've moved away from that and have offered "flex" dining instead on some long distance routes, which consists of premade, heated up meals. Nevertheless, I still found my salmon with rice and shrimp to be quite tasty. It's definitely a step-up from the café car food.
As the train approached Orlando, we began to encounter severe thunderstorms in the area. We were delayed several minutes at Orlando, and continued to chug along slowly as we continued on to Winter Park and points north. I assume the delays were weather-related.
Our car attendant came by around 9 p.m. to convert the room for nighttime use. I ventured down to the end of the car to try out the shower. I have to say, for a small shower in a train car they keep a good number of towels in there. There's even a laundry shoot for people to drop their used towels in. The water itself was lukewarm and I didn't spend much time in there, but it felt refreshing nonetheless.
I went to bed some time after we had departed Deland, around 10:30 p.m. Initially I was able to fall asleep, but this didn't last the entire night unfortunately. I think I might have gotten about two hours of sleep or so, as the motion of the train made it difficult to fall back asleep.
The next morning began around 6:30 a.m. as we departed Camden, S.C. The train was running close to 2 hours late at this point, but I didn't mind too much. Around 8, Eric and I made our way back to the dining car for breakfast. As I munched on the last bit of my French toast, we pulled into Hamlet, N.C., which has a beautifully-restored Victorian-style depot.
On my southbound trip on the Silver Star in April, we had completed this section of the route at night and my northbound trip didn't make it this far. So I never had the chance to see the Hamlet depot in the light of day before this trip.
Next was Southern Pines, close to the golf haven of Pinehurst. Southern Pines appears to have a charming little downtown area near the station.
The train continued north through Sanford, Apex and eventually Cary, where I got a glimpse of Amtrak's Piedmont pulling in on the opposite platform.
With our train having entered the region in North Carolina where I grew up, there was no more mystery in any of the scenery. Ten minutes later we pulled into Raleigh, and it felt odd not to be getting off for once.
The remainder of the route I'd already traveled dozens of times, so much of the excitement had worn off by this point. But it was enjoyable nonetheless, and I still had one more meal in the dining car to savor. For lunch, I had the beef short ribs with mashed potatoes. Like the salmon, very tasty despite its simplicity.
We arrived in D.C. around 4:45 p.m. -just a shade under two hours late. Honestly, the trip was so much fun I don't think the tardiness really bothered me. I really have to hand it to Amtrak for the way they take care of their sleeping car passengers. Our attendant was super helpful and made sure we had everything we needed. I also really enjoyed eating in the dining car, which is something I hadn't done in 16 years. For $388 (including the voucher discount), I definitely think the experience was worth the money when you consider that it includes both sleeping accommodations and meals. Coach is still great on Amtrak if you're going somewhere in one day, but for traveling overnight I'd highly recommend the roomette option. I may even make this an annual birthday tradition.
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