Amtrak’s Lakeshore Limited travels through four states: Illinois, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New York. The landscape is vastly different from that of the California Zephyr. These states actually get a lot of rain in the summer. Sadly, this was especially true on our trip, when the area was suffering the effects of Hurricane Ike.

We were four hours late arriving into Chicago, but our second leg of the trip would turn out to have the biggest delays caused by Mother Nature. We left the Chicago train station at about 11 p.m. on Saturday night. In the morning, our fabulous train attendant Maria told us we hadn’t even made it as far as Cleveland, due to flash flooding. At various points, the track was being fixed ahead of us.

We’d expected delays. So rather than grousing, we read, played games, talked, and took in the sights from states we’d never visited before. Our Viewliner Roomette was cozy, to say the least. Unlike the Superliner Roomette, it actually included a folding sink (!) and a toilet RIGHT next to the bed. In other words, you could hit the head just beside your bed. If you can’t laugh at the absurdity of this, you have no business on the train.

We were 10 hours late into NYC. No matter. We’d expected big delays. And we were in NYC! What is there to complain about?