Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Julie Aberman (Hochstadter) on December 16, 2011 at 12:33pm

Very cool, thanks for sharing.

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Permalink Reply by mark stetson on December 16, 2011 at 3:18pm

Thanks for the nice report.  I had wondered whether you did the ride or not.  I wish you had contacted me for more local information, but you didn't do badly.  You missed some things, but we all do when travelling.

You seem to be a railfan.  Thought you might like to know that IIRR has at least one engine painted in what I think is the last Rock Island paint scheme.  I've only seen it once, actually sometime around the time of your trip.  They had a recent derailment just east of Tiskilwa with numerous ethanol cars burning.  The town was evacuated. 

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Permalink Reply by Larry Mysz on December 17, 2011 at 7:21am

Paul,

Thank you for the trip report.  It brought to mind some very good memories.  Two years back my wife and I rode the Hennepin as part of a credit card tour into Middle Iowa.  We stopped at The Purple Onion in Annawan just in time to participate in a local man's 95th birthday party.  It was one of those magical moments you remember for a lifetime.

 

 

 

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Permalink Reply by Eduardo on December 19, 2011 at 6:21am

I love trip reports like these. Nice one Paul.

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Permalink Reply by David on December 19, 2011 at 7:11am

Thanks for the trip report.  I love hearing about these short bike trips around Chicago.  

I'm curious, has anyone here taken a non-folding bike on Amtrak to Kewanee?  I noticed there's a bike option on the Amtrak site, but there's also no baggage service at that stop.  Do you just box up the bike, let them take it, and let the baggage folks handle it at Kewanee?  Or do you need to do something special like jump out and remind them you have a bike in the baggage car?

Sorry if that's a stupid question.  I've never taken my bike on Amtrak, but it's something I'm planning on doing a lot this Spring and Summery.

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Permalink Reply by mark stetson on December 21, 2011 at 6:43pm

David:  I'm no expert on Amtrak's bike policies, but this thread has some practical information (although I think the $20 bill suggestion is a bit excessive):

 

http://www.thechainlink.org/forum/topics/getting-better-bike-access...

 

I'd be happy to loan a bike to anyone that wants to come to Kewanee or Princeton and ride.  You'd just have to put up with me tagging along.

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Permalink Reply by David on December 22, 2011 at 7:25am

Thanks mark, 

I remember that thread, but unfortunately it seemed that nobody had solid information in there on my specific question.  It's implied that you can't take a bike to Kewanee, but I'm not sure if that's definite or not.  It seems there's a lot of guessing going on in that thread.   I was kind of hoping for a solid "I've done that" or "I tried to do that and it wasn't possible."  "You can do it if you bribe the conductor" isn't quite as helpful as I was hoping for. 

But that's OK.  Come springtime, I'll figure it out for myself and report back. 

mark stetson said:

David:  I'm no expert on Amtrak's bike policies, but this thread has some practical information (although I think the $20 bill suggestion is a bit excessive):

 

http://www.thechainlink.org/forum/topics/getting-better-bike-access...

 

I'd be happy to loan a bike to anyone that wants to come to Kewanee or Princeton and ride.  You'd just have to put up with me tagging along.

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Permalink Reply by mark stetson on December 22, 2011 at 5:09pm

The post about getting the bike out of the baggage car at the stop before you need to get off the train seemed applicable.  Doesn't seem like the bribe should really be necessary.  I would contact Amtrak and see what they say.

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