April 4, 2008
Miami – Sebring - Palatka
Amtrak’s Silver Meteor/Silver Star
Economy Class

The last time I rode any trains in Florida was in 1984. I’d purchased two separate All Aboard America Passes for a combined total of $375.00 and commenced a 21,940 mile ride around America aboard 27 separate trains. Did I ever mention I enjoy riding trains almost as much as I enjoy flying? Anyway, one of the more enjoyable aspects of that trip from 24 years ago was blending all those train rides with flights aboard six little known and, with one exception, short lived airlines. Here are the airlines that I flew upon:

Sunworld International Airlines Las Vegas to Ontario DC-9-10
Cascade Airlines Seattle to Pasco Hawker-Sidley HS748
Horizon Air Pasco to Seattle DC-9-10
Northeast International Miami to St. Petersburg 727-100
Florida Express St. Petersburg to Orlando BAC-111
Air One St. Louis to Kansas City 727-100

Only Horizon Air still flies today. That flight was operated with a DC-9 wet leased from All Star Airlines. The aircraft was number 4 off the DC-9 production line. All Star sold it to Midwest Express in 1986 where it soldiered on as N500ME until it was sold in 2004 to East African Safari Express for whom it still flies today. All of the other aircraft flown have either been parked, scrapped or broken up for spares.

Once again I was taking a train to get to a plane, though the pair of American MD-80s I had booked between Jacksonville, Dallas and Denver were fairly ordinary compared to the eclectic collection of airlines and airliners I looked forward to years ago. American offered a much better roundtrip fare between Jacksonville and Denver than anything being offered out of south Florida. With the savings, I tried hard to find a way to fly aboard SkyBus Airlines, who was offering a $39.00 fare between Ft. Lauderdale and Greensboro, NC. From Greensboro or High Point I could catch Amtrak down to Jacksonville. Unfortunately, the times just didn’t work out in addition to which, sadly, SkyBus declared bankruptcy and ceased all operations on the very day I would have flown them up to Greensboro.

In any event, the new plan finds me riding a pair of Amtrak streamliners between Miami and Palatka, located just 20 miles down rural route 207 from Hastings, Florida where a good friend of mine lives. Now I could have just purchased a single ticket between Miami and Palatka but I liked the idea of riding the Silver Meteor up to Sebring, Florida and then connecting to the Silver Star for the rest of the journey on to Palatka. At Winter Haven, the next stop up the line, the Silver Star swings over to Lakeland and Tampa before returning to the CSX line on to Palatka. I’d never ridden the Tampa spur, so today presented an excellent opportunity to do just that. Layover time in Sebring would be just over an hour, assuming that each train operated on time. They didn’t.

Departure from the nondescript Miami Amtrak Station was on time but unfortunately we encountered a number of delays due to freight traffic and so rather quickly found ourselves running thirty, forty and then fifty minutes late. By the time we pulled into Sebring, it was almost 1:00pm. My onward train to Palatka was scheduled to depart Sebring at 12:59pm. Were we in Europe I would have been in big trouble, but here in Florida the Silver Star was also running late, so I wasn’t too concerned. Actually, the Silver Star departs Miami about an hour after the Silver Meteor and uses the exact same trackage up to Sebring.

I’ve ridden a lot of trains in my time and I feel quite confident in stating that Amtrak offers the finest long distance Economy class rail transport in the world. The seats are wide and well padded, have good recline and include a leg rest. The legroom is substantial (about a 55” pitch). In addition, a 120 volt power outlet is located at each seat. The lounge and dining cars offer comfortable seating with affordable and tasty fare.

It’s a three hour ride up to Sebring (four hours today). I spent the first two hours of it in the lounge car where I purchased a coffee and a breakfast sandwich for under $5.00 total and then retired to a corner table to read the morning paper and enjoy my breakfast. The scenery between Miami and West Palm Beach is unremarkable. The prettiest scenery is of course along the beaches, where expensive hotels and condos take up most of the available real estate. The old Atlantic Coast Line (now CSX) mainline runs much of the way along Interstate 95 until West Palm beach where the tracks head inland and the scenery becomes more rural. Orange orchards and attractive horse pastureland figure prominently for the rest of the ride into Sebring.

The Sebring Station was built in 1924 by the Atlantic Coast Line. After years of neglect through the seventies and eighties, the station was refurbished and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1990. It’s a nice looking little station but its location two miles from downtown Sebring leaves much to be desired. There are no businesses anywhere nearby and the only facilities inside the station are toilets and a couple of vending machines.




About a dozen people were waiting for the northbound Silver Star, which was running 45 minutes late. A little boy clapped his hands in glee as the big P-42 locomotives approached with a nine car consist in tow.








The coach cars were at the rear of the train and as I climbed aboard and took a seat in the second car from the end, I was ever so thankful for the nice, cool air conditioning because outside the temperature and humidity were fairly uncomfortable for a northerner like me.




Shortly after departing Sebring, the Dining Car steward issued the last call for lunch. That sounds like a great idea! An hour in the diner would make for a pleasant diversion from the six hour journey through Florida’s pretty though hardly dramatic scenery. Here’s a copy of Amtrak’s menu:

AMTRAK MENU

Seating in Amtrak’s dining cars is communal, so normally you can expect to be sat in whatever seat or seats are available. Rarely will one or two people ever get a table to themselves. Today proved to be the exception, perhaps because most passengers had already eaten. I was seated at my own table and had plenty of room to spread out a newspaper while awaiting my cheeseburger and chips.




After lunch, I retired to the lounge car where I put in some work on this trip report and had a nice chat with a couple from England who were three weeks into a six month trip around the world. They’d just spent two weeks in Florida and had another month and a half to enjoy the incredible buying power of their British Pounds in America before heading across the Pacific to New Zealand and Australia. I gave them some good tips on places worthy of a visit in the western U.S., along with the website for American Auto Driveaway, a good place to find cars needing to be delivered around America. All you pay for is gas.

We crossed the St. Johns River just south of Palatka about 8:00 pm. Minutes later I stepped off the train and took a moment to admire the beautiful old Palatka Railroad Station before piling into a lovingly restored Volkswagen van and heading off to Hastings with my friends.


April 7, 2008
Jacksonville – Dallas - Denver
American Airlines Economy Class
DC-9-80 N409AA / N411AA

Having booked a pair of American MD-80s to get me from Jacksonville to Denver via Dallas, perhaps I should have been more concerned. Hundreds of American flights had been cancelled in the past week due to the Federal Aviation Administration’s airworthiness directive related to the bundling of wires in the MD-80’s wheel wells. News reports showed thousands of unhappy travelers stranded in airports, which no doubt caused many more thousands of passengers to get all stressed out over their upcoming travels.

Honestly, I don’t worry about stuff like this at all. It might be different if I were a business traveler who absolutely had to be in Denver on the 7th and was limited in when I’d be available to travel. Thankfully, I have the luxury of flexibility. And, as much as I’ve flown, I’ve got a better sense than most as to what my options are and how to proceed. Were the cancellations still ongoing, I would have called American and discussed my options in advance. There are a lot of different ways to get from Jacksonville to Denver on American that don’t involve MD-80s. Rule 240 would also come into play in situations like this, allowing me to be protected on other carriers. In any event, it was a moot point because by April 7th most all of American’s MD-80s were flying once again anyway. The next day however, another round of cancellations began. So - I got lucky.

I actually enjoy flying the MD-80 or, as it was once more properly known, the DC-9-80, the largest derivative of the DC-9 family. My first flight on a DC-9-80 came in June 1983 aboard Hawaiian Air between Honolulu and Kahului. Since then, I have logged close to 300,000 miles on the type aboard fourteen airlines. Today’s flights were aboard a pair of 22 year old airplanes, originally delivered to American in 1986. As always, they provided comfortable and reliable transport between Jacksonville, Dallas and Denver. I’ll be looking forward my 296th flight aboard the “Super 80” next week.



Crossing the Mississippi River enroute to Dallas