Boys on Trains

A Story Drawn from Life, by Altimexis

The Vista Dome Boy

Posted May 28, 2025

The year was 1969, and I became an uncle at the age of thirteen. My sister, who was fourteen years older than I, had moved with her husband to California. After a couple of miscarriages, she finally had a successful pregnancy. Then, just as I was finishing seventh grade, she gave birth to her son. Of course I was anxious to meet my new nephew, but he was a month premature and faced a stay in the hospital before he could go home.

My mother offered to go out to California to help my sister take care of the baby. She gratefully accepted. Mom ended up spending the entire summer in Southern California. In retrospect, I’m sure my brother-in-law wasn’t exactly thrilled to have her there.

My dad spent days trying to convince Mom to fly out to California, but her only previous experiences with flying were in propeller airplanes. Dad and I were with her the most recent time, when we flew to New York for the 1965 World’s Fair. Mom was prone to motion sickness and spent the whole flight welded to a barf bag. She couldn’t tolerate riding on boats either. We tried telling her this time would be different — that jets were different — but San Diego was a long flight and there was no convincing her otherwise.

Mom took the train there and back and raved about the experience. When she got back, she talked nonstop about the scenic beauty along the way and the friends she made onboard the train. Dad, on the other hand, griped endlessly about the cost, which was more than double that of flying. He said flying was expensive enough!

We could’ve saved a fortune if she’d traveled in coach, but even Dad didn’t want her to have to sit for three days, with only the lavatories at the ends of the car for washing up. Instead, she had a tiny couchette, with a seat that folded down to make a bed, a toilet underneath the seat and a tiny sink in the corner. I couldn’t imagine traveling like that, but she said it was fine and besides which, she spent all her time in the Vista-Dome, enjoying the scenery.

By the time she returned from San Diego to our home in Indianapolis, it was already time for school to start, and so meeting my nephew would have to wait. Dad was anxious to meet his grandson too, so we made plans to travel to California over the winter break. Again he tried to talk Mom into flying, but she refused.

Mom had taken a train called the Super Chief, which took a southern route through the desert southwest. My parents decided that this time we’d take the California Zephyr to San Francisco, do some sightseeing in the City by the Bay and then take the train down to San Diego. The Zephyr was supposed to be one of the most scenic train trips in the world and the only way to see the famous Feather River Canyon.

However, the Zephyr left from Chicago and the connection from Indianapolis by train would’ve meant staying overnight in a hotel. After a lot of cajoling, Dad finally convinced Mom to fly to Chicago instead. Surely she could tolerate a half-hour flight, even if she did get a little sick. So on a winter day in December, we got up very early, grabbed our packed bags, took a taxi to the airport, checked our bags at the curb and headed inside.

Airport security was nonexistent in 1969, and we were able to walk right up to our gate. The gate was at ground level. At the appropriate time, we walked out onto the tarmac and up a set of stairs to the waiting DC-8 jet. I remember it was a DC-8 because it was sleek and had four jet engines under the wings, and I spent time looking at the information card in the seat back in front of me.

The flight to Chicago was over almost before it began. Once we were off the ground, Mom’s anxiety subsided and she had no trouble after that. Chicago’s O’Hare Airport had Jetways and we were able to walk directly into the airport. The place was huge, but a bit shabby. It was a challenge trying to find out where to pick up our luggage. Carousels hadn’t been invented yet, so we had to wait in long lines as the bags were slid out onto fixed ramps.

Dad tried to flag down a taxi, but they just kept passing us by. Finally, a fellow passenger showed us where there was a line for the taxis. We had to go to a window to purchase a ticket first, and then wait in a long line. Dad seemed to become more and more anxious as the time slipped by. It dawned on me that we might actually miss our train. Not only that, but we still had to eat lunch.

When we finally got a taxi, Dad impressed upon the driver that we had a train to catch, and he handed him an extra dollar with the ticket, which was a decent tip back then. It was a bit of a harrowing trip to say the least, but we made it with time to spare. Dad bought some overpriced sandwiches from a vendor that we’d eat once on board. Still, we had to find the track where the train was waiting and then find our rail car, all while carrying our luggage. Back then, luggage didn’t have wheels and Dad was too cheap to hire a porter. Then again, so am I, even today.

Our compartment for the trip was small. It wasn’t as small as Mom’s couchette had been, which was only half the width of the train. Our compartment ran the full width of the train, minus the narrow hallway outside our door. Getting all of our luggage up onto the narrow rack above us for storage was a challenge. It was only then that Dad realized we’d need to repack our things, as we’d need access to toiletries and some clothing during the train trip.

At the time, I didn’t think it curious that the compartment had only a seat designed for two. Later, I’d learn that a family compartment with three or four seats was nearly double the cost. As it was, my parents purchased a child’s ticket for me, based on an age of twelve or less. They insisted I tell the conductor I was twelve if asked. That didn’t sit well with me at all, but now I can understand it. We wouldn’t have been allowed to share a two-person compartment if I’d had an adult ticket.

There were two narrow fold-down bunks, the lower one of which my parents would share. Much to my amazement, the compartment had a tiny bathroom with a small sink, a toilet and a shower head over the toilet. Using the shower would get everything wet, but at least we wouldn’t have to wait until we got to San Francisco to take a shower.

We ate our sandwiches as the train pulled out of the station. It was a tight fit with two adults and a young teen wedged into a seat meant for two. The sandwiches were surprisingly fresh — considerably better than what we’d have gotten at a fast food restaurant. As we ate, the conductor knocked on the door and asked for our tickets. As he verified the compartment number and the destination, he told us the dining car was two cars up toward the front of the train, and he gave us the hours for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

The train car design used by Amtrak today is vastly different, with double-decker cars with coach seating upstairs and sleeping compartments below. The cars on the original California Zephyr sat entirely above the wheels, making a double-deck design impossible. Instead, there were Vista-Domes above the sleeping compartments. These were bubble-shaped all-glass structures with barely enough room for a thirteen-year-old boy to stand up. One didn’t need to stand except to enter or exit. One spent their time seated and watching the scenery pass by all around and above them.

Heading up the stairs to the Vista-Dome, there were already quite a few people seated there, so we sat were we could. At least we were able to find three seats together. At first the train was under the streets of Chicago, so there was nothing to see but blackness and the occasional work light.

Eventually, the train emerged into the afternoon light, and we could see the streets of suburban Chicago as we headed westward, leaving the city behind. Our speed was very slow at first, I guess because we were still crossing city streets, but the train sped up as the suburbs gave way to towns and more open space.

Dad said we should go to bed early so we could get up at the crack of dawn and grab a prime seat in the morning. I was not a morning person by any stretch, and I was a teenager, but I wasn’t about to miss out on seeing the scenery along the way. There was an overhead announcement that the dining car was open for dinner. Dad said we should try to eat early, so we headed right down to try to get a table. There was already a long line when we arrived.

By the time we reached the front of the line, all of the tables were full, so we had to wait a long time until a table with seating for three became available. I discovered there was also a line extending from the other end of the dining car. That helped to explain why the line moved so slowly.

An older woman was seated with us at a table for four. As Mom had already explained to me, trains don’t have the luxury of leaving empty seats in the dining car. Her name was Beatrice, and she was on her way to Sacramento to spend Christmas with her daughter’s family. She was quite the talkative sort, and over the course of the next forty minutes, she told us all about her daughter’s family, including their seven children. As much as she talked, I was amazed she was able to eat anything at all.

The meal selection was surprisingly good, although Mom warned us the menu would be the same throughout the trip. Because the meals were included in the ticket price, I splurged on the shrimp tempura appetizer, followed by the pan roasted chicken breast, with chocolate cake for dessert. It was all very tasty. Thankfully, no one asked if I had an adult’s or child’s ticket. There was no way I’d have been satisfied if forced to order from the children’s menu.

After dinner, Dad said we should get ready for bed rather than going back to the Vista-Dome. He wanted to get up at 5:15 — yikes! As he explained it, we couldn’t shower at night without having to deal with a wet bathroom in the morning. However, then there’d be three of us all trying to brush our teeth, shower, dress and in his case, shave. He wanted us to be in line for breakfast no later than 6:00, so we could be seated when the dining car opened at 6:30.

When we got back to our compartment, we found that the bunks had already been made up for us. I was surprised they had real mattresses with real sheets, pillows and blankets. Dad had brought our Baby Ben alarm clock that ticked and tocked all night. Sleeping on a train was an entirely new experience. For one thing, there was the clickety-clack of the tracks that went on all night, speeding up when the train sped up and slowing down when the train slowed down. Seamless rails had not yet been invented.

I wasn’t used to sleeping in a bed that was moving. The strange thing was that the side-to-side rocking of the train felt unnatural. With bunks that were perpendicular to the direction of the train, the rocking of my body was head-to-toe rather than side-to-side. With my eyes closed and in my sleep, I had the impression we were constantly speeding up and slowing down. It was a very weird feeling to say the least.

The alarm clock went off way too early, and then we faced the acrobatics of trying to get ready in a confined space. Add to that the desire to preserve our modesty, and our maneuvering was almost ridiculous. In retrospect, we should’ve just thrown our modesty out the window. We all just needed to get naked and get over it, but we were too inhibited even to consider it.

Mom knew I knew she had tits and I certainly had an idea what they looked like — not that I wanted to see them. Likewise, I knew that Mom knew I had pubes, but what if I sprung a boner? I was getting them all the time. The thought of either parent seeing me with one was horrifying. Only one of us could use the bathroom at a time. Naturally, I was last and had to take my morning dump on a toilet seat that was thoroughly wet. Brushing my teeth, combing my hair and putting on my underpants weren’t that easy either.

Finally fully dressed for the day, we gathered up the things we’d need and put everything else away. We marched up the stairs to the Vista-Dome. Finding it empty, triumphantly, we claimed three seats in the front row and put down our things there, including books for reading, a newspaper and even my camera. We didn’t even give a thought to our things being stolen. As far as reserving seats for the day, Mom said that’s just how it was done.

When we got down to the dining car, there was already a line, but it was shorter than the one the previous evening. The dining car opened promptly at 6:30 and we were seated with a Greg, young man who was a student at the University of Chicago and was heading home to Salt Lake City for the holidays. I asked him why he didn’t just fly. He explained that he’d always had a thing for trains. Back home in his basement, he had a huge model train setup that he and his dad built. It had three locomotives, two tunnels and a host of hand-made features. I thought that was cool. I really enjoyed talking to Greg. He was the closest thing to a passenger around my age that I’d encountered so far.

For breakfast, the French toast sure sounded good, but I couldn’t resist having a three-egg omelet with red peppers, onions and ham, served with tri-color potatoes and a side of hardwood-smoked bacon. Perhaps I’d have the French toast tomorrow. Of course Mom and Dad had coffee and orange juice. I had mine with a glass of milk.

After breakfast and a quick stop at one of the lavatories, we headed back upstairs to the Vista-Dome in our rail car. It was much more crowded, but our things had been left alone, just as Mom said they would be. Taking our seats, we saw seated directly behind us a young hippie couple who would become our constant companions on the trip. I’d never met a hippie before. Little did I know that in high school I’d have a classmate who was one.

The hippie couple on the train wore classic clothing with natural fabrics and raw leather, and of course they had long stringy hair, but it was clean. They were very soft-spoken when they talked at all, preferring to gesture rather than contaminate the environment with the spoken word. I never did learn their names, even though we were with them for nearly three days.

I seemed to be the youngest person by far in the Vista-Dome. I’d yet to find a kid anywhere near my age onboard, not that I’d gone exploring the other cars on the train yet. I reasoned that families with young children didn’t travel by train because of the difficulty of keeping their kids cooped up for three days. Also, San Francisco wasn’t exactly a ‘hot spot’ for a winter vacation. Plus travel by train cost a lot more than flying. Most families couldn’t afford to fly, let alone travel by train in a sleeping compartment. Mostly, they drove.

Once the train left Chicago, we traveled to Omaha, where we took on more passengers, but that was at around midnight, when I was fast asleep. So far, the trip had been a total bore — just endless prairie as far as the eye could see. That didn’t change until we reached Denver, which we did at around 9:00 AM. I was shocked to see that the mile-high city was as flat as my hometown was. However, Indianapolis didn’t have any mountains in the distance the way Denver did.

In Denver, additional cars were added to our train and four additional diesel locomotives were added up front to the two we already had. Apparently, we were going to be doing some heavy duty climbing. After picking up additional passengers, we were on our way and soon heading into the mountains. The scenery was stunning as we proceeded through the Rockies, passing through a series of tunnels and alongside icy creeks fed by partially frozen waterfalls.

We had a real dilemma when it came to choosing when to eat lunch. We didn’t want to miss seeing anything, especially given that the days were at their shortest. One of our nearby seatmates told us we mustn’t miss Glenwood Springs, so we opted for an early lunch, hoping to be seated when the dining car opened at 11:30. At least lunch didn’t take nearly as long as dinner.

I had the grilled patty melt with Swiss cheese and caramelized onions on sourdough bread. It was my first time eating sourdough and it tasted amazingly delicious. San Francisco was known for its sourdough bread, so I was really looking forward to eating more of it. We got back to the Vista-Dome just in time to take our seats as we emerged from a long tunnel. Right next to us was a steep mountain slope with skiers zipping down so close to us, it seemed like we could reach out and touch them. I reached for my camera, but by then it was too late.

We stayed glued to our seats until the sun set. Unfortunately that came far too early in the winter, at close to 5:00. We had just reached Grand Junction, which marked the start of the red rock country. It was then that I realized we’d be passing through some of the most scenic parts of the trip while we slept. Dinner that evening was with a retired train mechanic at our table who was taking advantage of his retired employee discount. He’d never married and didn’t have any family, but thought it would be fun to spend Christmas in San Francisco. At the time I thought it was sad he was alone, but now, on reflection, I would guess he was gay.

After dinner, we went right to bed, getting up again at the crack of dawn. Immediately, we knew something had happened, as the train wasn’t moving. I knew we’d stopped in Salt Lake City during the night, as I could remember being woken up by the sounds of the train station. We should have been halfway through Nevada, but we found out at breakfast there was a train derailment ahead of us. We were stopped while waiting for the tracks to be cleared.

After breakfast, we took up our position in the front of the Vista-Dome, but there was nothing much to see, so I got out the Tom Swift Jr. book I’d brought with me and proceeded to read. The train didn’t start moving again until after 9:00. We should’ve been approaching Reno by then but we were just nearing Winnemucca, 165 miles away.

As we passed through the area of the derailment, we saw that it was a freight train that had derailed — a car carrier. One of the other passengers pointed out that the Cadillacs had fallen on one side of the tracks while the Chevies had fallen on the other. The scenery in Nevada was pretty flat until we got to Reno, but unfortunately we’d lost four hours of sunlight. At least we’d picked up two hours of daylight since leaving Chicago, just from passing through time zones.

We again ate an early lunch and got back to the Vista-Dome in time to watch our arrival into Reno. I’d seen enough of Las Vegas on TV to have an idea of what to expect, but Reno wasn’t nearly as flashy. The setting was stunning, with the Sierra Nevadas all around us.

We were originally scheduled to arrive in San Francisco in time for dinner. With the delay, we wouldn’t get there until around 9:00, after most of the restaurants had closed. Dinner wasn’t included on this, our final day, nor was anything available to eat. On a tip from another passenger, Dad literally ran off the train in Reno and bought some sandwiches from the first vendor he could find. We were only stopped long enough to drop off and pick up more passengers, but it was still a longer stop than most. I was really worried he’d be left behind. He made it back in time, but without a moment to spare.

After crossing into California and passing through the town of Truckee, we followed the course of the Feather River, through the spectacular Feather River Canyon, into Sacramento, the capital of California. From there, we continued westward through hilly California countryside into San Francisco, the end of the train journey. If we’d arrived at 5:30 as originally scheduled, that wouldn’t have been a problem. However, it was nearly 10:00, and although there were buses and trolleys, there were no taxis to be found. We were staying at the Sheraton Hotel, and the only way to get there was to use the hotel shuttle bus system, which stopped at all the hotels. There were multiple bus routes, and after watching group after group of passengers departing on other buses, we were the only passengers left and our bus had yet to arrive.

Dad was livid as he used a pay phone to call the toll free number for Sheraton hotels. He was eventually connected to the front desk of the one in San Francisco. It was already close to midnight and we were exhausted. The hotel shuttle driver had gone home, so the hotel arranged for a prepaid taxi to pick us up. Finally, the taxi arrived and we were checked into our room in short order. Although it wasn’t the hotel’s fault, they gave us a complementary breakfast in the morning.

We spent two days sightseeing in San Francisco by way of Grey Line Tours, and then boarded our train to make the trip to San Diego. I’d been expecting a beautiful journey down the coast, but the train took an utterly uninteresting interior route until we got to Santa Barbara, so I spent the time reading my book. The route from Santa Barbara to Los Angeles and from Los Angeles to San Diego had some great ocean views, but our seats were on the wrong side of the train.

We were greeted in San Diego by my brother-in-law, who took us to their house. They lived in what to me seemed like a distant suburb of the city. Known as Del Mar, it consisted of barren land on which tiny tract homes were being built. There was nothing around the neighborhood — not even a shopping center — and I wondered why anyone would choose to live there. In the coming days, I learned it was because you could buy a brand new house, only a block from the ocean, for around thirty thousand dollars.

They ended up moving back east a couple of years later and sold their house for barely more than they paid. In retrospect, they should’ve kept the house and rented it out. Today, Del Mar is a sprawling city and even a tiny three-bedroom house like theirs costs a fortune. My sister’s house was not only a block from the ocean, but within a short distance of the Torrey Pines State Beach, Marsh and Preserve.

We spent the Christmas holiday with my sister and her family, and I finally met my nephew. While in San Diego, we saw the famous San Diego Zoo and other attractions. However, school was to resume right after New Year’s Day, so we had to return home to Indianapolis. I was really looking forward to taking the Super Chief train ride home, but Dad had other plans. He was a rabid football fan and in taking the train, he would have missed out on watching the playoffs.

Dad traded in our return train tickets and bought tickets for a flight home. He reasoned that if Mom could tolerate the jet trip to Chicago, she could tolerate the return trip by jet, and she did. Even with the added cost of booking one-way tickets, it was cheaper than taking the train. Mom was furious that he made the switch without talking to her about it. I was furious, too, and refused to talk to him for weeks afterward.

I’ve since taken train trips all over the world. I’ve ridden the Shinkansen ‘bullet’ trains in Japan and the Intercity express trains in Europe. I’ve taken overnight trains in shared compartments with five other people. Nothing I’ve done ever since, though, can compare to the experience of taking my first major train trip on the California Zephyr, more than fifty years ago, when I was just a boy on a train.