After arriving at my hotel in Bellmawr, NJ the wait for the ship began. The ship is currently in port at Charleston, SC and should depart today for Philadelphia. I should be able to board Sunday morning. There is nothing I can do but wait.
My hotel in Bellmawr, NJ
The hotel is not near as nice as it was presented on the Internet. But it is much cheaper than staying in Philadelphia proper. That is a fact I appreciate since I have had to add a couple of nights to my intended stay.
South Black Horse Pike in Bellmawr, NJ
The area is not really that nice. The area is typical new construction. There is a major street that has a couple of places to eat, a Wendy's, pizza joint, Chinese take-away and a Mexican tienda. There is really nothing here to see, but taking a taxi back to Philadelphia is not an option for me.
The strip mall where some small restaurants are located
So I wait. I have spent the time watch news on television (I am probably the best informed person in New Jersey), reading and writing. What else can I do?
My work area in the hotel
I will make a brief post on Saturday just to confirm that I really will board the ship on Sunday. After that I will be totally off the grid until I arrive in Hamburg. No cell phone, email, Face Book, etc. I'm actually looking forward to it as long as I can get moving!
Well, it wasn't really the City of New Orleans. I rode on the Texas Eagle from Longview, Texas to Chicago and then the Cardinal to Philadelphia. I suggest you play the song below while reading this post.
The Texas Eagle was half an hour late leaving Longview and I settled in for the long ride to Chicago. Boarding an Amtrak is the start of the adventure. There is really no method for boarding. The conductor stands at the door and the passengers storm the conductor each trying to board first as if there is a prize. My car was a double-decker with the seats on top and the rest rooms and luggage compartment on the bottom. I did not know this and struggled to get my luggage up a narrow stair case. Directly behind my seat was the lounge/observation car. This car was really great. The seats were big with plenty of leg room and the views were fantastic.
The Texas Eagle travels almost due north through Texarkana, Little Rock, St. Louis, to Chicago's Union Station. There was work being done on the tracks so the train detoured and was non-stop from St. Louis to Chicago. As a result we were actually an hour early coming into Chicago.
The St. Louis Arch from the Texas Eagle
Crossing the Mississippi River on the Texas Eagle
Since we arrived early in Chicago that just meant that my layover was one hour longer. I was really hungry but could not really leave my luggage in the crowed station to search for food. Finally we were told it was time to board and the boarding process started all over to board the Cardinal. After 45 minutes of standing in line I was on board and in my seat on the Cardinal bound for Philadelphia. We left right on time!
This leg of the trip was certainly more interesting. I sat next to a merchant marine that was able to tell me what to expect on the ship. I got a lot of good information from him. I also overheard some interesting conversations. This car was not like the Texas Eagle. It was single story and very similar to riding in an airplane. One conversation I overheard was an old hippie telling a man that George W. Bush caused 9/11. He claimed there were black helicopters guiding the planes into the twin towers! When the man said he had seen the videos of the planes and he did not see any black helicopters. The hippie then said they had been Photoshopped out. Then he claimed that Bush had violated the Declaration of Independence (not the Constitution) and should have been impeached. This same hippie also discussed being abducted by aliens back in the 60's and claimed he still had some good friends that live on other planets.
The train dipped down through West Virginia and traveled a ways beside the New River. This is familiar territory for me and I thought how much I was going to miss Appalachia while in Europe. The people of Appalachia are wonderful and the scenery is magical. I did hear many people mispronounce "Appalachia". There is no long "A" in Appalachia!
The train was getting further and further behind schedule. By the time we reached Huntington, WV we were two hours behind. The reason Amtrak is often late is that they do not own their tracks. The tracks are owned by Union Pacific, CSX, etc. Amtrak only rents the tracks and freight trains take priority over passenger traffic.
Eventually we made it to the Washington, D.C. Union Station. It was kind of cool seeing the Washington Monument and the Capitol building from the train. There we switched to an electric engine from diesel and the train really began to move. Three hours late we arrived in Philadelphia's 30th Street Station. I easily found a taxi and rode to my hotel in Bellmawr, NJ. All I wanted was a quite, peaceful ride to the hotel but my driver had other plans. He blared opera music loud enough to wake the dead.
Finally, around midnight, I arrived at my hotel. It looked better on the Internet! Oh well, it had a bed and a shower. I made immediate use of both.
Tomorrow I will post about my stay in Bellmawr. Check back then!
Since my ship, the Rickmers Hamburg, was delayed and the house sitter was arriving I decided to spend a week with my family in Longview, Texas. My sister and her husband were in Sand Diego visiting my son and his family so I got to spend quite a bit of time with my father.
My father's back yard
We spent a lot of time doing what it is we do when I am in Texas, eating. A lot of the foods I enjoy in Texas just aren't available in North Carolina: Whataburgers, catfish, Pittsburg hot links, real chicken fried steak, and Barbecue.
The Pittsburg Hot Link Restaurant in Pittsburg, TX
Pittsburg Hot Links
Chicken Fried Steak
Catfish Dinner
One day we drove to Shreveport, LA to eat Mexican food at the Superior Grill. It is very unusual for Texans to drive to Louisiana for Mexican food. I have to admit it was worth it.
Cheese Enchilada Combination at Superior Grill in Shreveport, LA
Margarita to go! Only in Louisiana!
We spent one day on Caddo Lake and took a paddle wheeled steamer for a trip up the river. It was on this lake and river that Howard Hughes developed the rotary drill bit that allows us to do deep drilling for petroleum.
Graceful Ghost on Caddo Lake
Caddo Lake
On Friday my time in Texas was over and it was time to make my way to Philadelphia to meet my ship. To get to Philadelphia I would take Amtrak. To get to Philadelphia I would have to go through Chicago and them back over to Philadelphia. Check back tomorrow when I will write all about my Amtrak experiences!
I have done a lot of traveling since my last post and I am going to break it down into three posts. I called my port agent today and I have at least one extra day in Philadelphia, so I have plenty of time before the ship sails.
I left Asheville on August 9, 2013 headed for Longview, TX on a Greyhound bus. What an experience that was! The bus was always behind schedule. The people on board were interesting, to say the least. One guy had a GPS tracking device strapped to his ankle, ther was a Buddhist (Hare Krishna?) monk that continuously play video games, and young men wearing their pants at their knees so that their multi-colored boxer shorts showed their rear ends. I have never seen so many neck tattoos on one vehicle! The bus was very crowded from Greenville, SC on. The bus from Greenville arrived late and that was it for the rest of the trip. I changed buses in Atlanta and from there it was straight down I-20 to Longview stopping in every little town along the way. At 3:00AM we arrived in Jackson, MS and were told to get off the bus so it could be serviced and cleaned. This means that they spray a little water from a garden hose on the windshield and fill the tank with diesel. The garbage left by my fellow travelers was still on the bus when we finally got back on board. It took a while because there was supposed to be a driver change and the new driver never showed up. Smart man or woman! Finally a driver arrived and we were back on the road to Longview two hours late!
The pooch in Shreveport, Louisiana.
I think I was the only person on the bus that did not smoke. At each stop everyone would rush off the bus and burn a couple of smokes as fast as they could. This led to the whole bus smelling like a smoky barroom on Sunday morning after a Saturday night. At each bus stop I was constantly harassed for cigarettes or spare change.
The bus finally arrived in Longview two hours late and I felt like I had just gotten off a plane from Europe. Bus lag? My father was waiting on me and I needed a shower and a nap. When I took my shower I scrubbed and scrubbed trying to get the Greyhound experience out from my pores. My nap was heavenly!
Tomorrow I will post about my visit with my family in Longview, TX. Check back then!
It is really getting down to the wire. In just a couple of days I will begin a six month trip that involves planes, trains, Greyhound buses, taxis and freighters. Last Friday I took my wife to the airport and she is already enjoying the unusually beautiful weather there. I am waiting on the house sitter and have enough time to worry about a million and one things that will never happen.
Here are my plans so far. First I will travel by Greyhound bus from my home in Asheville, NC to my boyhood home of Longview, Texas. Roughly 24 hours on a bus. Greyhound is probably better than the "Chicken Buses" in Central America, but not much.
Greyhound Bus Lines
After spending a week with my Texas family I will travel via Amtrak to Philadelphia. The last time I rode a train in the United States was after kindergarten graduation in the early 1960's. The trip will take two days and travels from Longview to Chicago to Philadelphia.
Amtrak
I will (probably) arrive in Philadelphia a day or two before the ship leaves. I will be aboard the Rickmers Hamburg.
The Rickmers Hamburg
I will be on this ship for about 19 days. There will be no internet access while on board so I will have plenty of time to read and write. The ship will port twice before arriving in Hamburg. She will port in Montoir, France and Antwerp, Belgium. I will be transmitting my position via satellite transmitter to my family in Texas, California, Japan and Germany. It is the only contact I will have them during the three week voyage. Hopefully my wife will be at the dock when my ship arrives in Hamburg. If she is not I have no way to contact her and I will just have to wait till we bump into each other in a city of about four million people!
My access to the Interwebs will be sporadic so be sure to check back often. Of course, my "friends" on Facebook will be notified each new post.
