On Wednesday night the train pulled into the Kamloops station about 8 PM and we got to the Doubletree Hotel by 8:45 PM. It had been a long but exhilarating day riding the rails. We'd need to be in the hotel lobby by 7 AM to meet the bus that would take us back to the train. So no time to explore Kamloops which was a much larger city than I expected. On Thursday morning we boarded the bus and got back in our same seats on the train. We'd be having first seatings today for both breakfast and lunch. Just as the train started pulling out of the station at 8 AM, we headed to the dining room.
Breakfast had the same menu as Wednesday. We tried the lemon/honey pancakes, bacon and avocado toast. Just as our orders were being taken, there was a power failure. This would be the first of many power failures for the day. The air conditioning stopped and it also impacted the galley. Then the train came to a stop. The power resumed, the galley was able to resume and our orders came. The pancakes had a great lemony flavor and the avocado toast was tasty with the smoked salmon. But the train was still stopped. And we remained stopped for the next two hours. We were told there was construction and congestion up ahead.
At 10:45 the train started moving out of Kamloops and we began to see the landscape of this part of British Columbia. It started off with lots of farmland. Then we saw terrain that looked like we had been transported to the Southwest United States. A desert-like landscape with scraggly mountains. In many ways the views were more remarkable than the snowy mountains we had seen on day one.
At 12:15 it was lunchtime and we were able to sit with friends we had met at lunch the prior day. We had a fun chat about travel with Mark and Mary Lynn. We had the steelhead trout and a Moroccan spice bowl. Both very good.
We headed back to our seats as the train made some progress towards Vancouver.
But at various times the train would have to stop due to congestion ahead. Or another time it was because the crew on a train ahead of us had "timed out" and had to be switched out. In Canada, the crew are only allowed to work twelve hours in a row without having at least a ten hour rest period in between. All these delays, coupled with our initial two hour delay, made it quite obvious we weren't going to be getting to Vancouver anywhere close to the estimated time. We weren't even halfway there and it was already 3:30 PM. Unlike an airplane, there's not a way to make up time on a train. A plane can increase speed or change flight paths to try to get somewhere faster. But a train is limited to the track it has, the maximum safe speeds and any other trains that are ahead on that same track. We had been provided a map off our journey on day one. Angie took a look and estimated we'd likely be at our Vancouver hotel by 11 PM. We'd only gone about half the distance required over eight hours.
Soon one of the guest services managers came onboard our train car and delivered good news and bad news. The "good" news? We had been on the train so long that we'd be getting dinner. The bad news? It was obvious we weren't getting to Vancouver anytime soon. Or actually at all - at least not by train. There were just too many trains ahead of us that would be causing further delays. Instead, the train would stop in Chilliwack where busses would meet us and drive us to our hotel in Vancouver.
Dinner was delivered to our seats. No first or second seating this time. It was chicken skewers on rice. The dining on Rocky Mountaineer is heralded as one of the signature experiences of the trip. This wasn't that. But it was remarkable that the galley was able to come up with anything at all.
By 8 PM we had pulled into Chilliwack which is about 100 km from Vancouver. They had arranged for busses to take us to our hotels. By 9:15 the bus was loaded and we made our way towards Vancouver. There was a bit of confusion on where our luggage would be. One guest service manager told us to check with bell services at our hotel. Then other passengers on our bus had rechecked their luggage underneath this bus. Where was our luggage? We hoped at our hotel. At 10:30 we pulled up to the hotel. Unlike our stay at the Doubletree in Kamloops, the Rocky Mountaineer staff had not provided us keys to our room. We had to wait in the queue to get checked in. After about 15 minutes we had our keys and headed to the room. And as we walked in the door I checked my watch and it was just a few minutes before 11 PM - as Angie has estimated. And our luggage was right there inside the doorway.
It was a very disappointing and sad end to our Rocky Mountaineer experience. We missed seeing the additional scenery and I really wanted to have the train pull up into the train station in Vancouver. But on the bright side we had our luggage and we were in the city where the next leg of this adventure will begin.
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