Rocky Mountaineer Day 1

Bucket List:  The Rocky Mountaineer Train!

Thank you, Mark, for getting up at 5:30 am to drive us into Vancouver to catch our train!!!

The Rocky Mountaineer train has been on our bucket list for ages.  It is a family owned business which began in 1990 and is now the largest privately owned luxury tourist train company in the world. It has had over 2 million passengers.

The reason we wanted to travel with the Rocky Mountaineer is because of the large dome windows and the fact that it only travels during daylight hours, so you don't end up sleeping through the Rockies.

We entered the station and the first thing we saw was a gentleman playing piano.

The station smelled like a perfume factory, but when we got to our car #12, we smelled no perfume at all.  God is good!

Today's train had 22 cars and 742 passengers.  Tomorrow we will pick up an extra engine to take us higher into the mountains.

Right away they started with breakfast.  First item on the menu:  cinnamon scones.  Yikes!  However, when we mentioned Frankie's allergy to cinnamon, NO ONE on our car (52 people) got the scones!  WOW!!!!  They all got english muffins instead. Plus they were great about the gluten free thing.  Okay, already liking this train and we haven't even started!

The alcohol came out at 10:30 am.  Anton brought one of his precious rocks on board and we named him Rocky.  Here is Rocky enjoying his early morning drink.

This was the perfect time of year for this trip.  The leaves were such nice colours.  These are the pictures Frankie was able to take with her camera:

These are what Anton could get with his camera:

Okay, Anton is in charge of pictures.

Everyone got really excited when we passed Hell's Gate.  This is where 750 million litres of water bottleneck.

The tracks are measured in miles not kilometers.  They were installed in the 1800s and it was decided it was too expensive to switch over.

Find Frankie:

There are 2 sets of tracks that go to Kamloops.  One belongs to Canadian Pacific and the other to Canadian National.  But all trains use one set to go inland and the other to go towards the coast.

For part of the day we travelled through the northern tip of the Mojave Desert, complete with sagebrush.

We saw some really long cargo trains, sometimes with up to 200 cars.

The train is required to blow its whistle whenever it gets to a tunnel.  Apparently one particular farmer thought this was causing his cattle mental stress, so he would come out and shoot warning shots at the trains with his shotgun.  The trains took him to court, and the result was that trains no longer blow their whistles at this particular tunnel, and he is no longer allowed to own firearms.

There were tons of wild animal sightings today.  Our car was near the back of the train, which worked to our advantage because whenever there was an animal sighting at the front of the train, they would radio the info to our car.

We saw dozens of bald eagles, some awesome osprey nests, some bighorn sheep, deer, elk, and there was one black bear that Frankie missed but Anton saw.  However, Frankie saw a wolf and no one else saw it.

The scenery was completely gorgeous all day long, but the couple in front of us paid no attention whatsoever.  He played solitaire on his phone, and she read a book.  HUH????

The afternoon snack was supposed to be cookies, but they had cinnamon in them (what is it with all the cinnamon?!?!).  So Maddie the cook did not hand them out until everyone was ready to disembark.  They did not want Frankie to be exposed to it, so they let us disembark first AND they got us a taxi to the hotel (free) while everyone else had to take the bus.  Bonus!  This is the first time Frankie's allergy has actually worked in her favour.

Our package included a one night stay in Kamloops.  Kamloops is a city in northern British Columbia with a population of 90,000.  The name Kamloops means "meeting of the waters" because it is where the south and north Thompson rivers meet.

Here is what greeted us in Kamloops:

We arrived in Kamloops at 6 pm.  We got to the hotel (Four Points Sheradon - very nice) way before everyone else, but it really didn't matter because they gave us the room key (and internet password) on board the train and our luggage was already in the room (it had been trucked from Vancouver).