OUTDOOR COLUMN
My wife, Beth and I love beautiful, outdoors scenery. When we had our outdoor television show, God’s Great Outdoors, we filmed fishing and scenery shows from Alaska to Central America.
So we booked a nine day vacation trip on Amtrak across the western United States.
We caught the train in San Marcos but soon encountered our first hiccup. Due to the recent rains, the track was washed out about Temple, Texas. So they loaded us on a bus and delivered us to Fort Worth. On the train again, we reached Chicago without further incident. The train moved fast from St. Louis to Chicago. A GPS showed us moving about 102 mph. We were running along a major interstate highway and no truck or car could keep up with us.
Out of Illinois, we followed the wide Mississippi River along the Wisconsin border into Minnesota and into Fargo, North Dakota. We were now in the northern part of the Great Plains of the Midwest. This was my favorite part of the trip because it was like a duck factory of the U.S. Thousands of small potholes provide nesting habitat for thousands of ducks and geese.
The prairie pothole region of North Dakota and eastern Montana has been in a severe drought for two years. But recent rains had flooded many of the potholes and waterfowl were paired out in most of the potholes. For a duck hunter like me, this was waterfowl heaven.
Greenhead mallards, Canadian geese and myriads of other ducks were preparing to nest and raise their young. We saw two different pairs of Canadian geese with their little goslings. Early Birds!
To most people the Great Plains don’t compare to the mountain scenery of Colorado but I love it because of the ducks.
We crossed the whole long state of Montana. The eastern end is very bare- flat wheat fields without trees or mountains. But this part of the state is full of wildlife. A friend and I hunted eastern Montana about 20 years ago and shot many sharp-tailed grouse, pheasants, and Hungarian partridges. We saw many mule deer and antelope but were after the feathers not the fur.
During the night, our train crossed the panhandle of Idaho and on to Spokane, Washington. We missed some beautiful scenery around Coeur d’Alene, Idaho because of the night travel. We did get to see the eastern side of Glacier National Park.
Down through the state of Washington, we followed the mighty Columbia River on our way to Portland, Oregon. Numerous fishing boats along the river were angling for salmon. Near the Pacific Ocean, the river is huge and evidently deep since we saw ocean going ships navigating the river.
Oregon is a beautiful place to live. We crossed some high mountain passes with much snow on the trees and ground.
Next major destination, Sacramento, California. But two hours out of Portland, we encountered another hiccup. A freight train ahead of us broke down. Freight trains own the tracks. Amtrak pays to use the rails. A major repair was needed that delayed us 10 hours. We missed our connecting train to Sacramento so an extra day was added to our adventure.
The Sacramento Valley is gorgeous. As we followed the Sacramento River, I wanted to be in the raft drifting with a fly rod in my hand. Or a shotgun. Waterfowl were everywhere. Huge orchards both apple and almond, lined the rails in the valley.
The section of Utah that we crossed was not very beautiful. Just desert and rocks. Very different from Zion National Park.
Entering Colorado at Grand Junction, we followed the Colorado River for many miles. Due to the melting snowpack, the river was muddy and not as beautiful as in later summer.
From Glenwood Springs into Central Colorado, we were in the awesome Rocky Mountains. Still following the Colorado, we were awed by gorgeous gorges, steep rocky canyons, towering evergreens, snow-capped mountains, red rock walls, bald eagles sitting in the tops of dead trees, colorful rafts drifting and finishing the whitewater and dark mountain tunnels.
From Denver we cross the farmland of Nebraska and Iowa en route to Chicago. Then boarding the Texas Eagle, we dropped southwest to San Marcos.
It had been a great trip. I love to travel by train. The whirring of the wheels on the rails, the gentle rocking of the cars, the lonesome train whistles all add up to a unique experience.
