72 Hour Sleeper Train Across America (New York to Seattle on Amtrak)

We will travel on a

sleeper

train

for 72

hour

s across the United States from New York City to Seattle, then from there we will cross the border into Canada and travel on another

train

for 95

hour

s back from Vancouver to Toronto, which means during one week we will be eating, drinking, sleeping and everything else on the trains, it literally sounds like someone is banging on the way. We will have a chance to see how the US cross country trip on amtr compares to the Canadian trip on the V railroad. This video will be the first half of our trip crossing the US from coast to coast.

To do this, we will need to connect two different trains. First we boarded the Lakes Shore Limited overnight from New York to Chicago and after a quick deep dish. pizza, we'll hop on the Empire Builder that will take us the rest of the way to the west coast, and of course the entire trip we'll give you a full tour of our rooms, oh no, and our honest thoughts on the food at this Feels More like a microwaved airline meal. If you're new here, we're Karen and we've been able to experience some of the best night trains around the world, including the world's longest train, the Trans-Siberian.

The most expensive train in the world, the Orian Express, the most picturesque train in the United States, the Starlight Coast, the most luxurious train in India, the Maharajas Express, can I book a cooking class with you, right, ma'am? Australia's longest train the Indian Pacific and many, many, more, we are very excited We will add another one to our list today and we should have come to the train station much sooner because apparently there is a huge Am track with free food, but it is already time to board our first train of this trip, once we get on this train, we will be.

I'm spending the next seven or eight nights sleeping on a moving train, room eight, the right place, okay, it's tight, do we have a room, my chance, yeah, yeah, we're here, drum roll, Please welcome to our home for the next 19 hours, oh God. It looks dirty but it smells clean as long as you don't look too closely, yeah I mean it's clearly an old train, I don't think it's their fault, whose fault it is, I don't know, oh we put it on 85 inches. here it's giving me flashbacks of azeron it must be 100° here I shouldn't be complaining at all we've been on some pretty rough trains wake up everyone how do we get this down?

We're on our way to Chicago, let's go. Alright, we just left New York in the distance and now we're rolling along the Hudson River and the crazy thing about this trip is that we actually tried to do the same trip almost 2 years ago, on the day it was going to be Los Angeles . Seattle and then take the train across Canada instead of New York to Seattle and we actually did the first half of that trip, we took the Starlight Coast to the California coast, it was a surprisingly good experience, but then when we got to the border, it was covid times and I had to take a test across the border into Canada and that test came back positive.

I had no symptoms, but I definitely had Co, so that trip ended up being cut short and we couldn't do the Canadian version of the trip, so this time we decided to try a different amtr route and compare what it would be like to cross the US by train versus Canada by train. I think I might be the happiest person to ever sit in this room. I've been on board for about an hour. I've become familiar with our new little house and have actually come to love it despite what I said when I first got married, so now I'm going to give you a full tour of our room, it's been so long since I did a Australia train tour last year, it's the last train in the room so forgive me if I'm a little rusty a couple of years ago when we traveled on am tr for the first time we booked. a family room thinking that would be the best room that gave us the most space.

Turns out if you don't have a family, you probably shouldn't book the family room. We'll start on this side, we have a sliding closure. door with a window, which is fun because we can see both sides, but if we don't want the window, we have a PR on this side, we have a closet, there is tape, which is a little strange, but that's to preserve it. of rattling as if the head of the car were here tonight this is what is going to happen also on this side we have the button to call the assistant if we need something we have a thermostat we do not have it on all trains and a fan also the button call to assistant is in English, so this time we won't accidentally press it.

I heard it, I didn't mean sh sh oh no, I didn't think it was really going to do anything um next to the sink there's a sign that says ice water which makes me think you can drink it, they have little glasses too. I just feel weird drinking water from the train sink. Here we have the only points of sale that we know of so far. There is a Ro light button. We have a cute little trash can. There are some stains here, yes. even another closet on this side I just noticed there's a ladder here, will you follow me to this side, whoops, fall here on top of the seat, we have a few more controls, the first is this knob that says speaker volume, it doesn't seem to work because no matter what I do, it's still very, very quiet.

I can barely hear the guy next to me. We have some light controls. We have a reading light on this side and I feel light. Mo once again. The seat is quite comfortable. This obviously goes. to be my bed tonight they like the top bug when we boarded they gave us our dinner menu they told us we could dine in the room as room service or we could go to the dining car and have dinner so I think I'll do that so we can see a different part of the train. These windows are the highlight of the room.

We increase the speed a little. We have this fun little extra chair. There is a little latch for the foot that looked like something. I wasn't supposed to press ow oh oh I thought this was the bottom, this chair is so fun because this way we both have a window seat and this is one of my favorite parts, the drain table, it weighs 1,000 lb and we can sit in front of it. each other cover each other's coffee in the morning or play checkers, I mean chess, comment under the chess or the chess board and they are the same because I don't really know.

I feel like if you want to sound more sophisticated you say Chess, if you want to sound like a 5-year-old you say Checkers, right? This is like Australia. I don't know what's going on now just wait until he gets to the bathroom and talks about his water shoes. You travel with water. Sho grandale, are you ready for this behind this. door we have our own bathroom and Dr roll, please shower, it is very small, like imagine the size of an airplane bathroom and that's about what you have, there is a wet bathroom, although if someone takes a shower, the floor will get wet, Be sure to bring the shower shoes you had.

Have watched many of our previous videos to appreciate this one. I don't know what's up with all the inside jokes. I brought my water shoes so that will be cool, for some reason we have toilet paper in these little plastic bags. It's hard work Pap without the roll, so it takes up less space and you can take a shower and all your toilet paper is gone. This really bothers me, they also provide you with whatever the medium sized wipes are called. you dry your hands with hand towels, hand towels and I'm making a scene here, okay, I really have to do it, and three body towels, that's what you call them.

Me, three towels, towels, I actually think the room design is amazing, there's a lot of really cool stuff it's just old the state of this tray table the random hammering to hold the room together the scuffs down here the tape adhesive the questionable quenlin literally sounds like someone is knocking dinner time not sure which direction the dining car is but We'll try it this way press press harder oh wow very loud how convenient it was just the next train car and the sun is setting over the hudson river right now. I remember being very impressed by the dining car on the Western train.

Costa too, this car definitely feels a lot newer than the rooms it has, like old school Diner Vibes, but in a good way Apparently a drink is included with your meal, so Cheers Cheers oh my gosh it does so much heat, two layers of double aluminum, I hate to compare. too much, but the dining experience on our last train on the way was really lovely. I think we had real dishes. This feels more like a meal on a plane. We are flying economy class right now in Canada. It will be a business class. have an economical experience, okay, I'm about to back out.

I said we have Kaa kebabs, plant based protein, spiced bosotti rice, curried cauliflower, chickpeas, peppers, raisins, cashews, scallops, it also came with some salad and a piece of hot bread oh. OMG, 10 out of 10, this has to be the best thing on the menu, it's better than the tortillini I bought from Aly. We stopped here for about an hour so we thought we'd go out and stretch our legs, it's been a long 3. hours it's cold and everything absolutely freezing oh god, painfully cold like I feel like I'm doing a PO Soak in the air here we're coming back now yeah let's do it oh my god oh got it you can go up to the station and shop upstairs once we get out there will be a cafe car all the way out front but it will open when it's announced it's just not open it's not open.

The cafe car will not be open until we receive the opening announcement, please close the door once it is. I'm done with the bathroom, don't put paper towels in the toilet, the backs of the seats in front of you are not trash cans, don't use them as such, there were a lot of rules, I felt like I was back at school. connected to Amra Wi-Fi right now it says Unsecured network exposing all unencrypted network traffic. It's great that Amtrak has Wi-Fi so we can get some work done and later tonight as we go to sleep we can watch. some shows, but it's also great that we have Surf Shark, which is a VPN that stands for virtual private network and it encrypts all the data sent between our computer and the Internet so that, when we connect to these unsecured Wi-Fi networks, we are protected from hackers and other people who want to do malicious things to us.

We've been using it for the last 3 years while traveling the world and have never had a problem, which is really surprising when you think about it, but it's the boring and necessary part of a VPN, it's never fun paying for something that's boring and necessary, but the good news is that this also has entertainment value because a VPN can also be used to change the virtual location. from your computer and get access to a whole new library of content, so imagine tonight that we are in another country and we want to watch the show that we have been watching recently, which is Ted Lasso.

It would be very easy to change the virtual location. from our computer back to the US and still be able to watch Ted Lasso if you don't already have a VPN, we obviously highly recommend browsing Shark, plus it's the only VPN that offers an account for unlimited devices and offers a 30-day money back . money back guarantee so there is no risk in trying it out to get started just click the link in the description below and I'm whispering because we just had some neighbors move to Albany so we're trying to be respectful of our room assistant.

I'll be around any minute to convert the couch into beds, okay guys come on in, then I can put the bed down guys come on in, great, awesome, thank you so much, see you tomorrow, thank you, we bet. Try, huh, it's actually not that bad. The bunk bed is gigantic, it's actually like the size of a double bed and I'm in a crib with the strap that will keep me safe. It looks like they added this pad on top of the chair, put a sheet, another sheet, and then this tilt kit. Oh. No E no, it's very curly why oh my God?

It's on my pillow, okay, quick tour of the top bunk. I have the same light controls that we have in the little cubby downstairs if I want to hold it like a cell phone or a bottle. of water or something and then also my own climate control it's also great to have windows from the top bunk and tons of head room even sitting upright are we too tired for Ted Lasso mhm or do you want to come and watch it with me right? tomorrow just for a minute we have seven nights just one episode seven nights just half an episode I used to get on a train and not even think about sleeping like maybe we would get so exhausted we could sleep anywhere good night See you in the morning, You're ready for the light to go out, here we go, oh, the exit lights up.

Good morning, solid. 6 out of 10 sleep. We also just passed through Ohio and should be in Chicago in about 2 hours. I feel like I'm not sure. how you feel about this big bottom bed it's very difficult if you want to do something besidessleep if you hadn't slept well we would just like to hit a rail on the pit train just say wow this has reminded me a lot of the bike trip. I know we probably cycled to this exact point at breakfast time, there was much more on offer for breakfast. I could have ordered an omelette or a breakfast sandwich or a lot of other unhealthy things like pancakes, but keeping it light because we're headed that's what it was.

Trying to sleep last night we headed to Chicago which is the home of deep dish pizza which I've never had so I had another coffee not bad I'm afraid they can't hit me okay woo to be fair . It was a long night changing my score to four out of 10. Time to get up, we got pizza to eat. We ended up about an hour and a half late, but 20 hours later we finally arrived in Chicago and I think we still have time. For a deep dish pizza and to see the bean first, we just had to figure out where to store our luggage, so we thought we were going to have to pay $10 to store each of our bags, which Everything went well, but it turns out that yes you have a

sleeper

not only do you have access to the VIP lounge, but you can also store your bags there for free, so we are completely free now that we are on our way to get deep dish pizza. because somehow we've been to 6 countries but never Chicago, woohoo, Chicago is something epic, the whole city feels like it's built around this river, so you can literally ride a boat through the center of the city, it's amazing, it's like the Venice of the I.

I'm sure if you're a Chicago native this is a very divisive topic, but we asked Instagram last night while we were on the train and L was the most recommended what the last two restaurants were of pizza, L's or po quads, it's okay, so between However, the two L's girano is number one for me. I'm a stuffed pizza guy. I'm not a deep dish. That's what this sign makes me want to do this. It is a good signal. LTI, sounds like Illuminati, okay, let's go eat pizza. Oh, that's a ball, oh my god, this place is full of such atmosphere.

I think we might have asked for too much. This is the most beautiful brusketa I have ever seen in my entire life. I'm glad you're doing this for me. Wow. Look at those cheeses, we got the L because we figured if they named the pizza after the guy who started it, it's probably pretty good, it's buttery. Crest, then they put the cheese first directly on the crest, then the topping, then the tomato sauce and the chopped tomatoes. the top, so it's the opposite of regular pizza, as I understand it, and according to the Internet, back in 1943, there was a group of Italians who lived here in Chicago in a place called Puna and they claimed to have invented the plate pizza deep Chicago style.

One of those guys was Lou and one day Lou said: I don't want to live here anymore. I'm moving to the suburbs, so he moved out of the city and started his own pizzeria. Oh yes, it's up to par. how long I would also like to mention that this is supposed to be small for two people, the Bretta was as good if not better than the bean pizza and now we have less than an hour to see the bean and catch our train. that the Google map says it's a 40 minute walk, all on foot, we won't take a taxi, oh well, it's very windy in Chicago today, which reminds me that Cara taught me something this morning.

I thought Chicago got its nickname from the weather, the windy city. It turns out it's the people, the people have wind. I think it means arrogant, but it's windy. It's actually physically windy, what the hell did they close the bean? Are you sure Paris closes the Eiffel Tower? That's like duct tape on the bottom. Actually, what a H over there, let me take your photo with the bean, I love it, I really wanted the classic tourist photo, it's bigger than I thought, although it's pretty big, okay, let's go to Seattle than Union Station in Chicago, it's an incredible building. the main entrance and now literally head to the room, as soon as we entered the room, we were called to the meeting.

I am very impressed with the amre lounges on this trip, great snacks, lots of seating, wow, so this train is called the Empire Builder and it has to be one of the most iconic trains in the entire Amtrak fleet, having a place to store your Luggage not being in the room is a deal breaker, okay our last train was only one story high and on this trip we are going to be upstairs this one has the coffee station car type of train. I'll take it wow it's so different it's so much better we literally left just in time at the time I feel like we could stay here and just tour all the restaurants for a month otherwise sit back relax enjoy your trip and always thank you for choosing it.

Okay, I did the last walkthrough, so I'll try to do this one just to change it up a bit. Yes, that light flashes every time we pass by. a blow that won't drive me crazy for the next 48 hours uh the room is actually very similar I think the floor layout is exactly the same we're just missing some space upstairs it's definitely shorter because this is a train two-story that We are losing the space upstairs where we keep the suitcases and also some of the headroom that I will have on the top bunk. I'm definitely not going to be able to sit here, it's not like it's possible. to last night, oopsie, hey dad, very similar layout, we have a closet here that, wow, Cara has already filled with all her winter clothes, similar sized sink, mirror, giant cabinet, a coffee stain, a little more space, this time a real toilet paper roll. it actually has cardboard in the middle of the trash can, the biggest improvement in this room is the seat, it's leather, it looks much nicer, newer, this headrest reminds me of what you would see on a delta plane, it just fits forgot to update it. the top looks like a kid ate that deep dish pizza we had today and then just took his hands and went to see something positive, let's get on with the negative, come this way, the biggest drawback of this room regarding the previous one is that I don't I don't have two rows of windows, but we are on the top floor, so when you sit down you are at the perfect level of the dice and you have incredible use.

Don't we have a way to play chess? Oh no, we can see it. Excellent. it's actually here, it barely has any texture at all, that's funny, I'll definitely be working there for the next 2 days, best of all we have an extra Outlet Wooh, I was really confused why they didn't put the outlets next to the desk on the last train , but at least we have one here this time, the same chair placed like this can be folded against the wall and then also a very similar bathroom, oh, also, a place to store your luggage up here or something to store, depends on how you do it look Similar bathroom installed about the size of an airplane bathroom.

If you go in a little bit, you can see that instead of using the tape on the closet this time they used it on the shower, now we've gone 24 hours without a shower. So we will definitely be trying this out. In fact, I'm very excited for the next 48 hours. There's something really relaxing for me about being stuck somewhere, if that makes sense. I understand how you might think it's crazy that we like this kind of stuff. but our life is like that, go, go, go, being forced to sit in the same place for 48 hours is actually quite pleasant, especially when, even though we are in the same place for 48 hours, we are actually moving, it is very productive, I love it. waking up and being in a new place than when I went to sleep in downtown Milwaukee milwa we just got to the observation car.

I guess it gets its name from all the windows that are already in use right now because we're from the walking train. station, but I think this will be a great afternoon office. Well, first meal on the Empire Builder and I feel like there's automatically a totally different vibe on this train because we're going to be on this train for two full hours. days like this is terrible that says a lot about our next 48 hours um like I was saying I was a little nervous but we're already in better shape than last night we have a semi-real plate but it feels like real glass applause More elegant, we both start with the salad mixed with some beer for our M.

We both got the bines with a pretty good plant-based meat sauce. I love the Italian theme of our day. I also had like five espressos the last one. but not least, we have a chocolate mousse cake, oh wow, bedtime is the best ever smaller buks, it's only 9:15, okay, see you in the morning. Hopefully the sleep score is better than six. I promise this mattress is harder tonight, not that hard. room up here I'm not a very tall guy and I'm still nowhere near being able to sit on this bed this is great good morning last night was better I gave it like a seven out of 10 it looks like it's been brutally cold here and there's almost no snow , so I opened Google Maps on my phone to see where we were and we passed through Rugby North Dakota.

There's a little icon that says it's the geographic center of North America, so I guess we're halfway there. I'm afraid to have breakfast. I ordered the breakfast sadilla with potatoes. I'm really excited about it in our M. Good stuff, great views of North Dakota. Wow, welcome to North Dakota, so we just stopped in not North Dakota as they call it. a fresh air break, which is whenever the train stops long enough for us to get off and get some fresh air, they just said man, no and I felt like that sounded so bad because it was spelled the same as Peno, so I've been looking I ALSO said I'm having a hard time skiing and I've been doing it for 50 years, what am I going to do on a snowboard?

You know, we were both wrong, yeah, it's my no, no, I, no, no, no, you were saying. before no oh I no oh maybe I was right at that moment we were asking that guy over there how to say the name of the city we are in and then it was like all those memes and short films that you see about how the people of the Middle West Looks like you have a dead branch there yes, I do, I'll take care of that for you, seriously, don't worry about it, no, I insist, that guy embodied everything, the meeting with that man made it worth stopping, well, me.

Today I learned something on this train trip. I didn't realize how much oil there is in North Dakota. We have passed tons of tanker trains, large storage facilities and drilling equipment. I think if you put me on this train and made me look out the window. And guess where it was. I would have said Texas as soon as I walked out and it was so cold. I would have known it wasn't the right time for my first shower on Amtrak. I actually took a shower in our California amra a couple of years ago and the shower just ran. out of the water it didn't go so well.

I have high hopes for this one, although step one closes and secures the shower curtain. Step two removes or adjusts the shower head. Step three adjusts the water temperature. Okay, obviously, I'm going to put it all the way. hot, okay, wish me luck while the car is in the shower. I wanted to show you some of the engineering I did last night to make this room a little quieter. First I learned that these used trailer heaters for the car I used yesterday in Chicago are actually very good. it helped cushion the banging that was happening between these two walls and then this is the handle that turns the water on and off and it sounded like a bell that was ringing constantly but the queenex fixed it so I think both of those things contributed to us getting some sleep better last night, well honey, that was amazing, it was so hot.

I never had to press the button every 30 seconds. I didn't press the button at all. I actually tried it and the button doesn't even work consistently. hot water constant hot water decent pressure I never ran out of hot water like it usually does at the end, you know you can feel it draining no, it was great. I only hit the wall twice, I mean I would give it like an 8 out of 10, well we ended up sitting with some new friends for lunch and we didn't want to disturb their mealtime but we both got the loaded baked potato with chili vegan.

I'm pretty sure we ate the same thing on the train from California and it was as good as I remember. At this point in the trip I have a lot of time to waste, so let me give you a quick tour of our carriage and show you how it is laid out. I'll start from the back and work. My way to the front, so we are currently on the upper deck and there are 1, two, 3, four, five rooms like ours. This is where there is free coffee from 6:00 to 11:00. There are 10 rets, which are the smallest rooms. Basically, we only have two seats and a top bunk inside, at the bottom of the stairs there is a place to store all our luggage and in the back half we have two bathrooms, not bad, a little bigger than the one we have in our room, but This side you have the shower with clean towels this is like a laundry bag for dirty towels and as you can see there is quite a bit more space in the shared showers than in the one in our room, also free soap, body lotion, shampoo andconditioner, which is a family room. like the one we stayed in on the Starlight coast another family room and then four more ATS rooms we get to Montana and it's snowing here this is amazing.

I don't love being cold, but if it's going to be cold it might as well be snowing, that makes it a lot more fun, okay, that's enough fresh air. I ran away so fast I didn't even grab my coat. Cheers Che Little T on my computer having happy little hours since last minute Bo. I'm also watching the TR try video. about Vil, which is the train we're getting on next to head back across Canada and let's just say it sounds like we're saying The Best For Last, this is going to be epic. I'm more for the car idea, but she makes things.

I want to do it all the time, so I thought there were some things she could do. I feel like I definitely improve with these D socks. Just because they are a dad doesn't mean they don't deserve to have a friend, you're right. Good morning, it's only 6:30, but on this trip our bodies have already crossed time zones three times, so technically thanks, it's 9:30, but I'm glad I woke up because the views this morning are absolutely incredible. We have gone. the flat arid land of North Dakota and mostly Montana behind and we have woken up to these big beautiful shining mountains, how do you sleep?

I don't know if I'm sleeping better or if I'm just getting used to it, so there we are. I'm currently passing through Levenworth Washington, which I've heard a lot about because it's like a German-themed town that's always sounded a little cheesy to me and I've never had the urge to visit, but apparently these are the mountains that surround it now. my wish list no matter how much I don't want this to end. I'm very, very excited to go to Canada and see the B.E. I have a feeling it's going to be much better. Don't know.

I can't believe it's almost already. It's over, I feel like I felt like getting bored. I just feel like, oh God, we're still on this train. What are we going to do? And I never got there. I could easily spend another two 3 days on the train. 72 hours later, we have crossed the entire country. We have a few hours to spend here in Seattle before we catch a bus. Take us across the border to Vancouver, where we will spend the night and then tomorrow we will take another train and wait 24 hours. It will take us back through Canada, but I think the next one will be a little longer. funny I didn't even know what I was missing on the track Am traveling by train there's nothing better than this what where where in the tree at the end of the tree the end tree the end I never see it I never saw it I never saw it's I've never been so sad I've never been here before so excited we weren't even moving he just looks rich and strong and I dance like I like my men photos of people taking photos welcome to the most disgusting place in In all of Seattle we didn't come here on purpose every time walls are covered in gum cigarette wrappers this is all gum she usually dances better than that i promise hey i love pizza it was a recreation of mine today