Train Journey in the US of A

I was very excited that I was travelling by train to Raleigh in North Carolina from Baltimore in Mary land. The excitement was understandable because I was taking a long distance train for the first time in all these years of visits to America. As I keep mentioning, the Public Transport system in US of A is not at all good, as everybody seems to be travelling by road in their personal transport what ever the distance.
When I decided to visit Ralleigh, many options were discussed. Srini volunteered to drop me which was nice of him but I felt to drive 12 hours up and down to drop me was not worth the trouble. We had visited the previous week end by car and had spent the week end with Anand and gone back to Baltimore. The distance between the two places is around 360 miles or so which is around 550 kms if my calculation is right.
The next option was to fly and that option was also ruled out as it is a pain to go through all the hassels of check ins, arriving early etc. and of course the cost is also not that attractive.

I said why not Grey Hound. Grey Hounds are big buses which take people across to many cities. Anand who had travelled by Grey hound was vehement in opposing that option. He said the buses are bad and the bus stations are worse and they are (the bus stations) so shady that I should not travel by that alone.

Next was to look upto Amtrack. That is what they call the passenger trains here. I was thinking I can travel by night so that I don't have to sit in the train the whole day. But to my surprise there was no night train at all between these two places. So we chose a train which would start at 10 a.m. and reach at 5 p.m. That was fine with me and we bought the tickets.
The interiors of the train was quite impressive and it was a chair car with lot of leg space and quite comfortable. It was a small train and it was almost full. I had not expected the train to be full as the day I travelled being a working day. So there were quite a few people who had time to spare to waste a whole day travelling.
The journey was very nice as the season being fall I could see lot of trees changing their colors and it was really a beautiful sight. I could do my hand work, read the book I had taken with me and I did have some chit chat with the passenger sitting next to me. It was exactly like a journey by day train back home where you exchange the small detalis about you and your family while gathering the same from your co passenger.
There were quite a bit of jolts , making me wonder about the track conditions, which was remiding me that I am a Railway man's wife who is sensitiveto the jolts. I had noticed while waiting to board the train in the station that some trains were delayed by 2 hours or so, which was put up on the big board. The other thing I noticed was it was a single track , and our train had to wait for other trains which were mainly freight trains to pass in many small stations. The freight trains were a sight to behold as they were so lenghy I just lost count. I am used to this habit of counting the bogies in any goods train when I watch them pass. It was more than 60 or so and the train had some four engines.
The train made stops in many stations and all these stations were small and had an old worldly look, one or two stations were almost on the main road. I could see the passengers being picked up by relatives parking their car on the road just near the train.
The train did have a caffetaria, but since I had taken some food and drink with me I did not bother to check it out.
At around 4.30 the coach attendant announced that we will be in Raleigh in another half an hour. So there was busy phoning time around, as each one of the passengers held their cell phone to call their dear ones to be at station on time. I was no exception, thanks to Srini I also had a cell phone with me.
We all got ready to get down as we could make out we were almost there. Now the train suddenly slowed down and came to a stop. It was amidst some trees and it was just 5 minutes to the arrival time in the station. There was no announcement and after some 15 minutes or so we heard an announcement apologising for the delay and telling us that there is a freight train ahead of us and so we are getting delayed. How long they did not say.
It was almost 45 minutes and still there was no sign of this train moving. So I cornered the Attendant and asked him why this delay and if there was a derailment ahead. He said there was no derailement but the freight train ahead had some technical problem and so they are checking it and he can not say how long it will take. Oh the Trains they are the same every where I thought. Then I called to tell Anand about this freight train ahead having a problem. He said I am just seeing a looooong freight train moving out of the station and so I think in few minutes your train will start. Luckily the train did start after a few minutes and it was just less than 5 minutes ride to the station. I reached after a delay of one hour.
But in spite of this I did enjoy the train ride.