The boarding call comes at 10.45.  I find my seat and get settled in for the trip.  I have no seating partner so there's plenty of room for me to spread out and relax.  11.09am and the train is pulling out of Penn Station, New York.  There are not many people on it so we are all stretching out and getting very comfortable.  For quite a while after leaving the station we travelled underground so I had no idea where we were when we finally saw daylight.  If you want to know the exact route we took, here is the timetable.  It seems that the heating has a few problems on these trains,once again it's like an oven and there is no way to get away from it, again it needs maintenance done, which will happen when we arrive at Washington DC at 3pm.  I'm just going to have to suffer with it until then.

I made a new friend within the first half hour, a charming little gentleman named Elijah.  We watched the scenery go by, seeing lots of trees, houses and the occasional fisherman on a lake or river, not quite sure what they were not knowing where I was.  We settled down for a little while to give Tigger a sleep and Elijah thought he might join him, but his mum didn't want him to sleep so early into the trip or he'd be awake all night.  He was showing me his books and toys and we had a great chat.  He's now watching me as I'm typing and wants to see what I'm doing.  He's just been over to have a look at his photo, and brought Tigger to look to.

At 6pm we arrived in Richmond, Virginia, one hour behind time, but we are informed that the driver is going to try to make the time up.  I hope so, or poor Gigi will be up waiting  for me a lot later than expected.

A group of 5 ladies joined us at Richmond, and boy what a lot of fun they are.  When I could understand what they were actually saying, (African American, Southern accents are very difficult at times), they were hilarious.  The gentleman and his wife that were in the seats across from me were laughing quietly to themselves I noticed, until one of the ladies asked if he had finished with his newspaper and could she please read it.  Of course she could, at a cost of $1.75, she was quite taken aback at first then got out her purse to pay.  He was only joking of course which started another round of hilarious comments.  One of them asked the usual question you ask when you get chatting to someone "what do you do?" I think his reply was the last thing they expected.  "I'm a minister".  Now one would think that would change things a little but not with these ladies, they had a good run with that one too.

The driver did as he promised and made up some time, we arrived in Rocky Mountain, North Carolina only 40 minutes behind time. It's dark now so no photo's from here to Columbia.  No reading either though as the overhead lights have suddenly gone out.  Little Elijah is awake again and chatting away as 3 year olds do.Our next stop is Raleigh (or Rawleigh as everyone else is calling it), NC scheduled time of arrival 9.13 ETA 9.53 unless we can make up more time.  I'll wait until we reach there before calling Gigi with an ETA in Columbia.  Most people on the train are calling family members to let them know we're behind time and they will also contact them when we reach Raleigh.

We did make up a little time once again and arrived in Raleigh at 9.40, and still no overhead lights to read with.  Luckily my window has a station light right outside so I can read while waiting for the train to move out.  By 10.15 everyone is getting anxious as to why we haven't left the station yet.  One lady, who has hardly been in her seat the whole trip, had asked an attendant what the delay was.  Maintenance problems, again.  The train has lost all electrics and they are trying to either get a new engine to come out to us or get some poor bugger out of bed to come fix it.  No one is allowed off the train and it is stifling in here.  A few of us go to stand by the open door just to get some fresh air.  No sooner had we got there than the attendant complained that he was cold and he closed the door on us.  I think he enjoyed doing that as we never saw him smile once the whole time he was on the train.  One young girl was getting worried as she had an appointment early in the morning and was concerned that she would miss it, his reply "I'm only doing my job and I can't do anything about your problem, you'll just have to sit down and wait like everyone else."  Another lady decided she was going to call a friend who lived 10 minutes away and get them to come pick her up.  She had a job and a half convincing this guy to let her get off the train. I sent Gigi a text message to let her know what was happening and to go get a few hours sleep.  I figure we won't arrive in Columbia till somewhere around 4am.

Finally it's 11.30pm and we are on our way, with the electrics all fixed.  A new engine would have taken a lot longer to get to us and it would have been daylight when we arrived at our destination.  I had it in mind to send Gigi another text at 3am but fell asleep and woke at 3.15.  Sent the text message but told her not to rush as I'd still have to wait for my luggage to be taken off and found.  You have to give these train drivers credit though, he made up a little more time and we arrived in Columbia at 3.40, Gigi and Dale are due at the station at 4, which left me with only a 5 minute wait after waiting for the luggage cart to get from the luggage coach to the station officee, the luggage to be unloaded from the cart, baggage check tickets to be checked and removed and a walk around to the front of the station office.