Our excitement at the start of this trip was palpable.  We picked up the Doug and Barb Sunday morning at 8:00 am for our 20 minute drive to the Stanwood Amtrak platform and the start of our Alaskan adventure.   Our northbound train to Vancouver was to arrive in Stanwood at 9:08.  From there it is a two and a half hour train ride to Vancouver where we were scheduled to arrive at 11:45.

Our past experience with trains is pretty much isolated to those trains we used extensively in Italy.  When the schedule in Italy says the train will depart at 8:30, you know that if you arrive at the train station at 8:33, it is too late and the train has already left.  Here in America, we arrived 43 minutes early for our 9:08 train and we waited.  9:08 arrived and left with the four of us still waiting.  At 9:45 our train finally arrived.  We boarded our iron horse chariot and left any worries about the extra waiting time behind in Stanwood because we had plenty of time built in to our schedule.  We only needed to be at the ship to check in two hours before it was leaving at 4:30.  Our train however was involved in so MANY delays!!!  We had to stop a number of times and back up to change tracks so we could wait on the side while a train coming from the opposite direction passed.  We waited for another 20 plus minutes at the Frasure River as the train crossing bridge was open for passing boat traffic.

When we were still on the train as we’re closing in on 2:00 pm, I was starting to get antsy as our built in cushion time had all but evaporated.  We still had to clear through Canadian customs, then find the line and stand in it in order to take a 10-minute cab ride to the cruise terminal where we then had to check in with Holland America plus clear through US customs in order to board for the Alaska cruise.  For some reason, the Vancouver train station had no avenue for us to pull into the station.  Our train ended up having to motor completely past the station and afterwards spend at least 20 minutes backing up into the Vancouver station where we would then “be invited to detrain” as the conductor said.  One of the strangest things I’ve seen.

In the end, there was no need for worry as we were able to overcome every obstacle and still arrive with time to board the ship.  We probably missed the main crush of on-time boarders!  Our ship pulled out at 4:30 and we are now heading north about 15 knots an hour as I sit here.

We had a nice dinner, but the four of us have had a long day and we said good night and turned in to our respective rooms.  It is now after 10 pm and our shipboard internet is so slow, it won’t even load a new page before timing out.  I will try again to post this early tomorrow morning.