Canada/US Rail trip next summer . . . .

[JennyWreny]

We (DH, me and 2 teens) are planning a trip next summer and before I book it, I wondered if anyone might spot any glaring mistakes I've made with the itinerary. One thing I'm really concerned about is if I've planned to be in cities where there are big events on, like the NYC marathon for example (I've checked the marathon dates!).

21/6 - Fly to Toronto (3 nights)
24/6 - Tour to Niagara (1 night)
25/6 - Train to New York (4 nights)
29/6 - Train to Boston (4 nights including a day trip to Cape Cod)
3/7 - Train (1 night) to Chicago (1 night)
5/7 - Train (2 nights) to San Francisco (6 nights including a day trip to Yosemite and a day trip to Monterey)
13/7 - Train to Santa Barbara (1 night)
14/7 - Train to LA (3 nights)
17/7 - Flight home

Also I wondered if anyone could tell me if £510 per person is a good price for those flights (LGW->Toronto and LAX->LHR) on BA - it seems cheap, but this is the first big holiday we have done in many years, so I'm doubting myself.

Bumping for you, now those on the right side of the Atlantic might be awake

I don't know about the events but just wanted to direct you to seat61.com it's a brilliant website that tells you everything you need to know about foreign rail travel.

1 night isn't long for cape cod. Wouldn't you be better doing 2 nights Boston and 2 Cape Cod.

Are you going to book pre Brexit? We're dithering now having seen that other thread.

I am no help with the itinerary but I think £510 for the flights seems a good price :-)

I'm going to look at train travel now, we are going to San Francisco next May and I was looking at a way to get from there to Yosemite but couldn't seem to find a train. I'll look again!

Sounds fabulous x

Thanks for bumping BackforGood . I’m shamelessly bumping again. Think I’m going to book tomorrow am really worried that the price will go up if I leave it too long.

That’s a lot of cities! I live near Boston and would suggest that cape cod in day using public transport would involve a lot of travel and not seeing much. Boston is a small city so you could probably do most of what you wanted in 2 days and then go the cod for a couple of days too.

With all the traveling, I think that you would be missing out on the amazing national parks.

How strange, I couldn't see any replies until I posted and then they all appeared!!! I obviously hadn't refreshed - sorry I missed them!

Nomad86 I'll take a look at seat61 - I did look at a review of the California Zephyr on there, but hadn't looked at more general info - thanks.

P3onyPenny
It was actually just a day trip to Cape Cod we were looking at. I hadn't really thought about staying there - is it mainly beaches? Although we have 4 nights for Boston, it's actually only 3 full days. We arrive mid afternoon on the Saturday and leave at lunchtime on the Wednesday. I will look at the train again and see if we could stop at Cape Cod on the way from New York for a night or two instead of doing the day trip. Thanks for the suggestion.

Re the Brexit thread, I have discovered that I can book flights and hotels as a package on the BA site and some of the hotels that I had picked out on Expedia were cheaper using the BA package deal, but the best thing is that the BA package, you only pay a deposit (for my trip it was £350 total) until 5 weeks before. If you cancel any time up to that point then you would lose the deposit which makes me less nervous than if we had paid for the whole flights.

The other thing that's been in the back of my mind was that the £ may drop in value after Brexit and therefore securing the hotels at a £ rate now, but making sure that they are cancellable is (hopefully) a good plan. It seems to be possible to do this on Expedia (and get cashback with Quidco (11% at the moment)). My New York/LA hotels were more expensive on the BA package, so I'll book those through Expedia.

Curlybrunette We are thinking of a coach trip from San Francisco, although it's super expensive (>£100 each) and a very long day but gets great reviews. There's definitely a train/bus combo for Yosemite but I think that takes longer. Here's the timetable - www.amtrak.com/content/dam/projects/dotcom/english/public/documents/timetables/San-Joaquins-Schedule-050718.pdf - page 5 for the Yosemite connections. Looks like to get to the park by noon, you'd need to leave SF at 5am!

Thanks for all of your help and ideas everyone.

Thanks Montybabe. I'll take a look at doing a Cape Cod stopover! I think we could maybe get off of the train at Providence.

I know what you mean about missing out on the national parks, but originally this holiday was meant to be just the west coast (SF & LA) and the other stuff has been tagged on. The train goes through the rockies and beside the Colorado river, through the Sierra Nevada so hopefully we will see some great scenery on the way. We did talk about going to the Grand Canyon, but decided that will have to be another time!

Wow thanks for the BA tip,that's really useful. Have they released flights for next July/ Aug yet?

I just had a look P3onyPenny and it seems you can book flights at the beginning of August (I tried 7th) but not later (I tried 21st). Our trip is post exam celebration, so we will be going end of June.

If you didn't want to book a hotel through them, I guess you could book a package with them but just book one night (you don't have to book for the whole of your stay - it doesn't need to match your flights) in their cheapest hotel and not use it. Just so you could take advantage of only paying the deposit.

I had a look last night JennyWreny and saw how long the train took, I think we'll give that a miss! I have a bit of an itinerary planned (lots of cancellable rooms booked on booking.com) and had planned to hire a car and stay in Yosemite for 1 or 2 night.
I know your plan is to do a day trip to Yosemite but in case you decide to stay over get booking accomodation now. The lodges/tents I wanted in Half Dome Village were already sold out for next May, when I tried to book a month ago. You can book with www.nationalparkreservations.com and get a refund if you change your mind. There is still accomodation available, but it seems to be at least £350 per night, I was hoping for a bit cheaper!

With regards to a day trip, I've seen this It's a hop on hop off bus tour of SF with a Yosemite day trip included. As you said it's a long day (13 hours in total) but I did notice it says there's free wifi on the bus, my DSs would be pleased with that!!! It's £150 each but including the SF hop on bus I didn't think it was too bad.

P3onyPenny yep flights are out until mid August 2019 :-)

Thanks Curlybrunette. We've now booked the flights/trains and hotels for our trip (some hotels full cancellation option on Expedia). That San Francisco trip looks good. Thanks for the link. I can't remember if it's mentioned up thread, but did you know that if you want to go to Alcatraz you need to book a few months in advance (I think).

The US is awake, Niagara is very close to Chicago, so would it not be better to visit Chicago while you are in the area?

We always fly Norwegian or Icelandic, both very cheap

Flying into Toronto is likely to give you big immigration headaches into the US. It would be better to fly into the USA.

Three nights is a long time in Toronto unless you have specific plans.

Ditto, Boston - I would recommend a couple of nights on the Cape where you have a beach day. Also, go to Plymouth.

Thanks for posting RedneckStumpy and CraftyGin

It's all booked now so no opportunity to change the main part of the itinerary - I was worried about losing the good price on the flights. The train to San Francisco leaves from Chicago, so we have to visit NYC and Boston before getting that. We did think about Boston-NYC-Toronto-Chicago which would have been a more obvious order, but we dismissed that plan for some reason - possibly a combination of flight cost, train times and that it would mean we were in Toronto on 4th July (which seemed a shame for a holiday mostly spent in the USA).

We will be crossing the border at Niagara Rainbow Bridge on foot. Hopefully, with confirmed hotel bookings and a flight home booked then we shouldn't have too much trouble. CraftyGin is there a particular reason you think it will cause headaches, is it that we will be entering the US from another country (other than our home country). I was tempted to book our overnight hotel on the Canadian side of Niagara as that seems much nicer, but we have to catch a train on the US side at 6.47am and the thought of getting held up at Immigration at 6.15ish was a bit worrying, so we will cross over in the evening.

How much did you pay for train and flights?We were considering the same train but had trouble getting reliable quotes for next year. I don't think you'll have any bother re immigration. We did it a few times on the west coast without any bother.

P3onyPenny our flights were £510 each, BA Gatwick->Toronto then LA->Heathrow. We will get the Gatwick express/Heathrow express, so the different UK airports wasn't a problem for us.

The trains, I booked directly with Amtrak and cost (each adult) -
Niagara -> New York - $66
New York -> Boston - $49
Boston -> Chicago - $91
Chicago -> San Francisco (roomette) $497
San Francisco -> Santa Barbara $44
Santa Barbara -> Los Angeles $31

If we hadn't booked a roomette (which includes all meals) then that leg would have cost $138 which would have made the total for the train £325 (each) which I think is pretty good value for 5,500 miles! If you are looking for next summer then it's worth booking up soon to get the saver fares (although they are non refundable). The saver fares for some of those trains that I booked had sold out.

I guess you have probably already realised that the long distance trains, are often running behind schedule because they use the track that belongs to the freight companies and therefore freight trains get priority. For example see pic from the current eastbound Zephyr! Therefore, make sure you leave plenty of time if you have to make connections!

How much were the teens for the roomette?

$497 - they have adult tickets - child prices are only up to 12 years old on Amtrak . Actually, I just looked on the site and child prices don't make much difference, it would have been $86 cheaper (each child) for our trip on the Zephyr if they had been under 13. I think this is because when you are paying for the roomette, you pay for the room, irrespective of whether it's for adults or children.

P3onyPenny if you are thinking of the California Zephyr though you should probably read this - trn.trains.com/news/news-wire/2018/08/27-amtrak-says-it-will-not-run-trains-on-routes-without-ptc

We had already booked, so will have to wait and see if it's fully train or train/bus or if we have to have a plan b and fly some of the way (which would be cheaper/quicker, but would be disappointing). PM me if you want more info.

Thanks that's really helpful. Thinking we might split the trip. We were going to do NY and Cape Cod,then get train and get off near Monument Valley,go up to Yosemite and flynout of SF. But thinking it might be better to do a California trip another year as cost of train for us would not be much less than another set of flights iykwim.

No worries. It's the roomettes that really push up the price. Otherwise the train is reasonable value. It sounds like your option of splitting the trip into two holidays is a good one. Unless you really wanted to go on the train then it's probably not worth it. For us, the train is almost like another destination that we really wanted to see, if that makes sense! We are also planning to use the train journeys as time to relax and recuperate between the big cities.

I know we did too but we're trying to fit a lot into a month and I'm scared it'll spoil it. I actually think the train might work out more for us as we have 3 teens. Weve done The Starlight Express from Seattle to San Francisco and reverse. It's a lovely experience. Still not sure,had my heart set on going Coast to coast and the train. Dp and I could do it on our own at some point though I guess.

If you are still considering trains, then it might be worth taking a look at the Southwest Chief, which also goes that direction (ending up in LA) - www.amtrak.com/routes/southwest-chief-train.html

It's the third kid that scuppers things.