How to ride Amtrak

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Taking the Amtrak train anywhere is an extremely no-frills experience. It’s leaps beyond Greyhound, but miles behind any airliner.
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It’s slow. For those of you who are accustomed to the speed and convenience of planes, the truth is that Amtrak is neither fast nor convenient. At its best, the routes often take as long as, if not longer than, it takes to drive. At its worst, its riddled with delays (one of which turned my 2 hour trip from Milwaukee to Chicago into a 4 hour adventure).
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Plan for it. For the international travelers, particularly those who’ve ventured from North America to East Asia, you are likely well-acquainted with being contained on a moving vessel for over 10 hours at a time (that 18hr Amsterdam to Osaka route on KLM has trained me well, I’ll admit). But even if you haven’t been on a flight that long, think about what you’ll want to do for a long time and give yourself what you need.
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• Computer (but don’t bank on wifi availability, you will likely be disappointed)
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• Books (audio, print, digital, etc)
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• Earphones (obviously)
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• Food (I personally had no desire to eat the diner car food. I can’t speak to it, so try at your own risk.)
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Also, I don’t know about you, but baby I like to take my naps – on planes, trains, etc – so don’t think you’ll need something to do every waking hour. I slept the first 4 hours of my return trip to Atlanta, woke up in Meridien, MS to no wifi, and wrote this on an offline Notion doc. I have 3 books I can entertain myself with when I’m done writing. The man in front of me is swiping through dating apps I’ve never seen before, the man beside me is literally producing music on his computer, and the women behind me are, in charming New Orleans accents, chatting with someone on the phone just loud enough for me to want to put my earphones in.

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Why I’ll keep riding
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I’ve never seen such beauty in the South as I did on the Atlanta to New Orleans and back ride. Never before have I had an active desire to see and explore the natural landscapes of central Alabama and Mississippi. Had it not been for this train ride I simply would have never known something like this was down here. I sent a video of the scenery to my friend who, not initially knowing about my trip, jokingly asked if I was in the Amazon rainforest.
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It was cheap. $92 roundtrip on a holiday weekend. With literally 1% of the hassle of air travel, especially given recent events. I arrived to the station 15 minutes before my train’s departure. I pick a seat, sit down, and get on our way. As for those extremely expensive train rides when it’s several times the price of a flight, I wouldn’t encourage. Stick to tolerable lengths at justifiable prices. 13 hours there and back for under $100 to New Orleans made sense to me. If you want to take the train, only take the trip that makes sense to you.
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I’m revamping the way I travel to be slower, more local, more easeful. I want to see more of the South. I want to spend less time in airports. Amtrak, for any city along the Crescent line at least, offers me an easier way to get to where I want to go at a much slower pace. I wouldn’t ride this all the way up to New York, but surely Virginia, North Carolina, and other Southern destinations will be seeing me on this train.
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A sensible Amtrak ride – one that isn’t too long or too costly to be justified – is quite a gift and is perfectly suited for embodying the phrase “going along for the ride.” It is for the ride that I intend to use Amtrak as often as I can. I have a tendency to romanticize things, I’m aware, but the ride from Atlanta to New Orleans and back is for the most part one of the most beautiful things I’ve seen in a long time. The train horn that follows along, blowing out intermittently along your journey. The views of parts of the country that you’d never see by car and certainly not by plane, whizzing by at just the right speed for you to soak it in and admire it for what it is: pretty as a picture.
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To see the dirt transform into red clay and to know, as a result, that I wasn’t too far from home was a joy that felt very grounding. To read a novel in the empty diner car as the sun sets on the forest you’re traveling through. Being pulled between a riveting mystery and the enticing canopy just outside your window. Amtrak is for the romantics. Those who aren’t in a hurry, and who, on the contrary, would very much prefer to take it slow.
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So if scenery seems boring to you, then my dear by all means catch the flight. Take the drive, which is often on wide highways far from the beauty enveloping the train tracks. I’m sure everyone doesn’t take the train for the beauty or the pace. But I do. On trains, I am allowed the literal and hypothetical space to unplug, disconnect, and just enjoy the ride.
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I felt the same taking the train from Nice to Paris and from Budapest to Gödöllő. But now it’s different. I’m seeing the South in an entirely different light and I’m loving every bit of it and look forward to seeing more.

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Thalia, 27, has taken Amtrak to four states now and is intent on exploring the country through many means of transportation!