Journeys

It was a Friday afternoon and I was wondering if life could get any better than this. My husband, Darren, and I were sipping wine as the coastline sped by outside the train window. Trays of cheese and crackers lay near plastic cups containing several varieties of wine. As I reached for another sample, my eyes were dazzled by the ocean outside the window, glimmering in the late afternoon sun. The wine tasting was an afternoon event for sleeper compartment passengers on Amtrak’s Coast Starlight train. We were traveling up the California coast, having left Los Angeles earlier that morning on the first leg of a trip across the United States entirely by train.