After breakfast, I searched around the station for a place to plug in my computer so I could continue writing this travelogue, I found a plug near one of the doors and continued writing. At about 10:45am, I went outside and photographed a few Acela Express trains as well as some coaches before our boarding call was made for Train #449 – The Lake Shore Limited. At about 11:35am , I boarded the train in Amfleet II Coach #25059. The Consist for today’s train is shown at the bottom of this page.
   My coach is a refurbished coach with the AC outlets at each seat, funny how on this train, the café car has no outlets as it’s not refurbished, actually this car is still in it’s as-delivered setup with the orange and brown interior with tables on both ends. After leaving Boston, I headed to the café car and picked up a Turkey & Bacon Sandwich and a Diet Pepsi and continued to write this travelogue. We left Framingham, MA at 12:22pm, 4 minutes late. Or next smoking stop would be in Springfield, MA.
   At Springfield, I got off the train and took a few slides while everyone else took a few drags of a cigarette before we left there at 2:29pm, running 19 minutes late. We had 3 more speed restrictions before we arrived at Pittsfield, MA. After departing Pittsfield at 4:01pm, we sat just past the platform for a few minutes for CSX Train Q-420 to pass us as the railroad drops to single track west of Pittsfield. We had one more speed restriction to deal with before switching to the Post Road Branch (CSX Post Road Subdivision) which would bring us to our next stop at Albany-Rensselaer Station. We arrived in Albany around 5:15pm about 30 minutes late. I went up inside the station and met up with a friend of mine who would ride with me the rest of the way to Buffalo, he would then continue onto Erie, PA, then ride #48 back to Albany the next day.
   We sat in the station at Albany-Rensselaer and waited for Train #49 to arrive and couple onto our train. Train #49 arrived with P32AC-DM #701 for power, it pulled in on the #2 Track while our train sat on the Main Track. Train #449 would then move forward out of the station, while #49’s power was disconnected, #449 would then back onto #49 and a switcher came by with 2 road railers for the end of the train.
   We reboarded the train and would end up leaving Albany-Rensselaer at 6:50pm, running 50 minutes late. Announcements were made right away out of Albany about the dining car service, my friend and I decided to head for the dining car after leaving Schenectady, we left there at 7:19pm. My friend and I decided that sitting in the coach was rather boring so we headed to the lounge car, and waited a bit until space opened in the dining car. We tracked our progress across New York State with my GPS. Somewhere near Utica, we finally got into the Dining Car as they were busy as usual. This time around, they had no menus to hand out but came to our table and let us know what was available, I opted for the T-Bone Steak with Mashed Potatoes, Corn, and a Dinner Salad & Roll with a Diet Pepsi along with a big piece of Chocolate Cake for dessert, the total came to about $29.25 but it was totally worth it! The steak was one of the best I’ve ever had especially on Amtrak, it was seasoned perfectly, no need for A-1 on this steak!
   Myself, my friend and another passenger all ate until after the train left Syracuse at 9:28pm, we headed back to the lounge car and ended up staying there through Rochester where we left at 10:42pm, now only 32 minutes late as we made up some good time across the state. I had a nice conversation with a woman who was on her first train ride, our Assistant Conductor joined in on the conversation which lasted until we passed the Batavia Hot Box Detector (at least I heard it on my scanner!) when I decided to get back to the coach and get my stuff together as another otherwise excellent Amtrak Vacation was about to come to an end. We arrived at Buffalo-Depew at 11:32pm only 12 minutes late. I said goodbye to my friend, and got off the train, a very large group of passengers got on in Buffalo and a few minutes later, I was on my way home for a well deserved shower and a good long nap on a bed (slept the past two nights in Amfleet Coaches!).

Closing Commentary:

   This trip turned out to be excellent with the exception of my experience on the Cardinal. The equipment problems on this train were no fault of the onboard crews but were directly caused by someone not taking initiative in Chicago where the train was assembled, to at least put one coach on the train with AC outlets that we could actually use! There was one drunk passenger on the Cardinal who nearly got booted off the train in Indianapolis but was eventually allowed to continue riding. The crews on every train I rode were excellent, professional and courteous, accommodations on every other train were good to excellent, I suppose the Federal could have used Capstone Rebuild Coaches instead of stock Amfleet I’s but I guess you can’t have everything. Until next time when I take my next trip to complete my Christmas Shopping for 2004, Happy Railfanning…