The Rail Pass - Segment #4: Lakeshore Limited

The way that the Rail Pass works is that each segment counts against your allowance of 10, even if that segment was added by Amtrak due to track work. So, technically speaking, this part of the trip is comprises of Segments #4 and #5 but for simplicity, we will just refer to this as segment #4!

The dates for the Lakeshore Limited fell on a day for track maintenance and we transferred to an Amtrak bus upon arriving at the Albany New York station. Because it was mostly overnight and partially by bus, this was one of the most underwhelming portions of my trip. I did spy out a couple of views of Lake Erie after sunrise. Having just completed a trip on the California Zephyr, this probably should have been a flight from Chicago instead of using two segments of my pass!

Picture of a sign at the Erie, PA train station

The bus dropped us off at Boston South Station. I'd finally got to see the station in person I'd been eyeing on Google Maps for the past year. I tried lunch from one of the delis and waited for my commuter train out to my hotel in Denham.

As it turns out my trip coincided with the Boston Marathon and the opening days of the Karen Read trial. But I'd not come to Boston for those things, having missed the Washington DC iteration, I was in town to attend the Boston Small Business Expo.

States visited: Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, and Massachusetts.

Despite the letdown from the train trip, the Small Business Expo was a success, I met lots of people including someone else from Maryland. After the Expo, I walked around and explored the city before heading back to my hotel. I saw the Federal Reserve of Boston and considered taking a tour to compare it with my experience in Chicago but decided against it. Despite living in the city of Atlanta for over a decade and passing by the Atlanta Fed "early and often," I'd never taken the time to complete a tour, even after meeting people who worked there.

I decided to stayed an extra day and explored Denham before taking the Northeast Regional back to DC.