This site will help you a lot: Amtrakexplorer.com
(Sorry about spelling but I’m dictating this while I’m walking my 20 K steps lol)
There’s really an art to it and you can only kind of figure it out by doing it. But at the same time, it’s not as hard as it seems.
Step one as you need your Amtrak app because that’s where you’re gonna order all of your tickets (segments). And it’s always important to know that in order to not lose a segment all you have to do is cancel if you’re going to miss it and if you have a complicated route with two or three segments in it and something gets messed up or canceled in the middle of it, call Amtrak and they will be very helpful so that you don’t lose the segments that you already have booked. I say that because sometimes segments can sell out.
also, some segments have less activity; for example, the Texas eagle, which is a super cool line, does not run every day. So you have to plan for that.
Here’s my tip about buses. First off I would never take a bus ride that was more than say five hours the whole point about being on the train is you’re gonna be on it for hours you don’t need to spend that time on a bus. That said, Amtrak buses are fantastic and they take great care of you. So are local buses, like in Colorado you have Bustang and in Utah you have Salt Lake express. From what I have heard, greyhound is not fantastic in fact it’s downright scary (the passengers are).
So I would recommend not taking greyhound to Nashville, which is Amtrak‘s option for getting to Nashville. what I did is I rented a car in Birmingham Alabama and drove to Nashville. Getting there from Memphis might be another option.
New Orleans was absolutely phenomenal. I also took the train from New York to Birmingham and it goes right through Washington, which was stunning to look at and it would be amazing to stop there.
At this point, I’ve taken almost all of the long distance routes and I can’t tell you there’s a single one that I didn’t love. They are all beautiful because this country is beautiful. The Western trains are super liners meaning they are double-decker, which is pretty cool. Everything east of the Mississippi is single level because of the lower tunnels oh the other thing I have not yet taken is high speed (the Acela).
Chicago was amazing as well so was Kansas City and St. Louis. All of these stations are absolutely stunning and they’re such part of the fabric of the history of America. When you go to the Chicago station you realize what a lie we’ve been told about our real system. this is how our country was built and it’s still highly functional. It’s just that long distance travel by train is not something that most people are going to want to do so that’s a niche prospect but people still do middle and short distance a ton.
To answer another posters question, I only rented a car one time which is when I wanted to go from Birmingham to Nashville. The whole point of train travel is it drops you right in the middle of town wherever you go. No TSA tons of legroom food and drink on the train, and you can take whatever you like on the train. The only thing with bicycles is, they can be tricky because some lines are not commuter lines and therefore the bicycle needs to go in the baggage compartment, which makes it a little bit more tricky. Just do your research or call one,800 USA rail and they will help you out.
I have not yet taken the city of New Orleans, which is the train that runs along the Mississippi between New Orleans and Chicago
