All Aboard the Holiday Train

Soren had his first train ride last Saturday! We joined our friends Jim, Dana and Ned on the Alaska Railroad's Holiday Train down to Seward.



It was a fun trip, but I did wish that a) it had been light outside for more than 2 hours of the 9 hour round trip; b) the train could have gone a little faster, so that a round trip of 240 miles wouldn't take 9 hours, since I can't see the pretty view anyway; c) it had left sometime after 7 am (WHAT DO YOU MEAN Soren and I have to get up before 9:30?); d) the music hadn't been quite so loud for the majority of the trip, especially the part that was before 8:30 am; and e) Soren hadn't spilled my $7.00 cup of Bailey's on the return trip. Wow, that's a lot of complaining, but honestly, we did have a good time. I mean, who can resist this much shiny festive stuff?



So, to start with, the train left at 7 am, and sunrise is at 9:45, so we didn't get to see anything out the windows until 9:15. It was slightly unfortunate, since the view along the route is gorgeous. It wasn't that bad, though -- we were treated to a lovely sunrise. And we even got to see some wolf tracks in the snow at one point.



There were a couple craft projects for the kiddies along the way (make a paper chain, a paper snowman, etc.), and the elves (college students dressed in green felt dresses and red-and-white striped tights) passed out little presents. Soren got a Rudolph stuffed animal, which he now calls "Ashew" or something. I'm not sure what that means. Santa came around and had pictures taken with all the kids -- Soren started waving his arms around like a madman just as his picture was taken, but surprisingly, the picture is great -- it just looks like he's waving at the camera. I'll post the pic when I have access to a scanner.

We got into Seward at 11:30, whereupon Chris and I launched Mission Get Soren to Take a Long Nap Because He Woke Up Three Hours Earlier than Usual and Didn't Sleep on the Train. We had lunch and ignored him, which almost worked but not quite, and then went to a coffeeshop and ignored him some more, and he finally dropped off for an hour or so. Chris and I even got to play an entire game of Scrabble while Soren was napping.

We then had about an hour to actually walk around Seward, which was part of the point of the entire trip, and we got some nice shots of the view from the SeaLife Center:



And then some sunset pics from the train depot:



Upon our 5:00 departure, it was time to explore the train. Intriguingly, there was a Tiki Bar listed on our train map, but it was closed for some reason, so we had to content ourselves with walking up to the gift shop (Soren got a little model Alaska RR engine as a souvenir). Chris and Jim happened upon the "adults only" car in their wanderings; I'd assumed it would be full of 25-year-olds dancing to techno and drinking spiked egg nog, but apparently the car was devoid of decorations, silent, and full of old people sleeping. What a festive way to spend a full day and $120. Hey, at least they didn't have to look at or listen to any rotten little kids.

And then came the most exciting part of the trip: the winnings! Soren did some lovely scribbling, which we entered into the five-and-under category of the coloring contest, and he won! Third place! His prize was a little M&M figurine filled with M&Ms, and he gets to play with the figurine while I take care of the candy! And then there was an interminably long raffle, wherein 20 train trips to places none of us had heard of (as well 5 trips to Denali) were given away very loudly over the train PA system. Chris and I did not win any of them, and I figured that was OK because we wouldn't be able to take the trips anyway, and then they announced the final prize, which was a $45 gift certificate to a local bookstore, and I said, "Hey, I want that one!" It turns out that if you say you want a raffle prize, your number gets called! Sweet.

Thus ends the tale of the Holiday Train. Now excuse me while I deal with all the stuff we have to take care of before we move on Sunday. I'll leave you with a picture that shows just how tired Soren was on the train trip... he was SO good, though!