Kansas City to Albuquerque on Amtrak
On Wednesday night, I changed trains in Kansas City, from the short-run Missouri River Runner to the Southwest Chief, which runs Chicago to California. We were late upon arrival (about midnight) in Kansas City, but the Chief was held for us. Thankfully. Sleeping in a train coach is a real challenge, but still preferable to the hard benches in the Amtrak section of the magnificent (but not necessarily comfortable) Kansas City Union Station. On Thursday morning, I woke up to early light in the rolling plains of western Kansas and I parted the window curtains to start watching the passing sights. Grain elevators, dusty red roads, a man fixing a wheel, a German Shepherd lolling on cool concrete, water running full in an irrigation ditch. Then we were into the southeastern corner of Colorado, where the terrain changes again. We glided between low gray mesas dotted with scrub oak and mesquite. The sky was overcast with only occasional peeks of sunshine, so there weren't good v...