Crossing Florida by Amtrak

 My parents left to get back home and then we found out that the train was going to be delayed.  We had drunk the two bottles of champagne that I brought with us to have mimosas and now the guys went back to Publix to get some beers for the wait.  In the meantime, the Amtrak station said that we were boarding, but it was just an automated thing.  We weren’t really and then they told us that the train was stuck in Lakeland because a freight train broke down and they estimate 3 hours.  We decide that we’re now going to need lunch and dinner on top of brunch, so go back to Publix for more Cubanitos.  It’s a good thing too because even though the train is only delayed by two and a half hours, we are hungry now.  

    We’re finally boarding the train and have 8 bags between the 3 of us now because we’re bringing some groceries to the Bahamas.  Luckily, we’re in first class on the train and the seats are awesome, there is plenty of room, lots of places to charge things and we all settle in for a 3 hour ride.  There are several stops for depots and stops for other things too, that don’t make any sense.  In Europe, this train ride would take 30 minutes, but in the US, it takes 4 plus hours.  It’s truly ridiculous, but we’re getting across Florida for $25 each, so we’ll deal with it.  We finally get to West Palm Beach because they won’t let us go on to Fort Lauderdale, which when you

search Amtrak, doesn’t seem to be a stop.  We’re going to move to the TriRail system that serves the east coast of Florida.  But, with the delay, we’re now outside of the train every 30 minutes or so time frame because it’s now after 6pm.  We get our tickets as a train pulls out and now it’s going to be an hour before the next one.  REALLY!!!!!

But it gets worse.  We get to the right platform and they say that it’s going to be longer than that because there has been an accident on the track.  They’re not sure when the next train is going to leave.  We sit at the train station for over an hour and a half and start to ask about a refund and are looking for Ubers to the hotel when the train finally comes.  We find out that the train before us was stopped because of the accident and they had to take everyone off the train, put them on buses to the next stop and we are able to avoid that, but we go slowly through the part where someone drove through the crossbars and died tonight on the TriRail track.  So, the idea that we were late in order to avoid being on that train or closer to that ordeal, makes us all sit back and take a deep breath and be grateful for a safe trip, regardless of the time that we get there.  We finally check in at the Hyatt Place in Fort Lauderdale and are told again that there is no shuttle at the time that we need it, but we don’t care anymore.  We all just tumble into bed and agree to get up early in the morning for breakfast and getting an uber to the port.