Journal: Oakland to Vancouver

November, 2005

Wednesday, 16th. Leave home at 7:30 to walk one block to the local bus stop. Wait in mild weather wearing heavy clothes. Full moon and brilliant Mars on the Eastern hills. Full moon loony buzz on bus the length of Telegraph Avenue. My tension over trip abated somewhat by early blunt and supper (tortellini with asparagus and red bell and a glass of stout). But the 72 connection pulls away despite my hustle and I must wait so laden with valuables in proverbial downtown Oakland. Beside me in the shelter is a rather fat semi-black lady. She sits silent until a animated little black lady shows up and they discuss Hurricane Katrina refugees. Fat lady sounds New Orleans. They say rent subsidies have run out for them, how a lady they know was offered a room-share in exchange for sex by a “benefactor.” Lonely driver pulls up in 72 and soon we are stopped by a freight train crossing Broadway. She’s quite annoyed by the delay but cordial to me. The bus drops me at the Oakland Amtrak station’s glass pyramid.
Inside there is considerable effort spent issuing me my 30-day North America Travel Rail Pass and US tickets for my East-bound trip. After some question arising out of the competence or commitment of the various station agents, they get it sorted out and I start signing traveler’s checks. I go to the lobby on the side of the tracks and sit near train-travelling folks in late their late fifties/early sixties. The guy almost breaks his leg retrieving his water bottle from between the seats. I had pointed it out to him and feel some concern for him.
Enough to rub his leg for him with a “God Bless you.” Instant friends we chat until near train time when I go outside to deserted platform to finish me blunt.
Sit down a while and Starlight Express nears, then I scurry to a rear coach car. Directed to a seat, I find a guy sprawled and snoring. I sit nearby until an Amtrak gal reassigns me to another window seat. For this she wakes a Wild West character with a handlebar mustache. He is from Texas, lives in Oregon and is very polite and mostly considerate. He has me copyediting his tales of Oaxaca on his laptop before Emeryville. When I tell him I once lived there he shows me his digital photos of the region and I actually recognize the beach at Salinas Cruz. He even has the café I entered in my green BVDs to join my friends after a minor mishap body-surfing. I give him some times and then slowly withdraw into the night scenes passing the train window. Training though Berkeley I ride the source of the perennial train whistles tonight.
Somewhere in the night woods of Northernmost California I either see or hallucinate a ring of underground fire covered by dark material. Then we’re beyond.









Thursday, 17th. My second day is wild and a bit frazzled. I can only rest while others sleep. I get up and wander a little during the night. Have to have coffee at dawn—the world outside is too striking to sleep through--strange things like pens of reindeer. The black guy in the canteen admires my new train duds—I tell anyone who mentions them how little I paid. I have on a whiskey-colored winter coat, a green plaid woolen shirt-jacket , beige corduroy pants, and some brown suede train slippers when I’m not wearing my black leather Australian boots. For outside wear I have beret or stocking hat, black wool gloves, and a hand-knit green wool scarf—all of which along with another flannel shirt, long-sleeved jerseys and flannel pajama bottoms worn under my pants, all to see me through Winter in Canada and the Northern United States.
Snow abounds on the craggy ridge we follow. Ravens circulate in nearby trees as we stop in order for “road” repair. Through tunnels the train enters a land of water and trees, lakes and rivers. Lake Klamath is vast and thrilling in the early light. I have rice krispie prescription treat with my yogurt. “Smokers stops” are announced throughout the trip; these are train stops long enough for folks to get off the train a while, light up and stretch. I get off at every one but they are few on this Express route. My enhanced snack will help me not to miss them. The distant snowy peaks turn super-real.



Of course, I am friendly with my fellow passengers in coach. People like me who sleep in their seats because they can’t afford sleeping cars. There’s a thin Buddhist gal who also got on in Oakland. She’s from Vancouver lives in San Francisco when not in Asia restoring temples. There’s Jesse a nineteen-year-old with a real resilience and charm despite a harrowing saga. He was abandoned by his meth freak girlfriend with no money, trapped for three days at the Phoenix airport. He couldn’t get a ticket and was not allowed to walk out of the airport. The girl sounds like nothing but trouble and is now incarcerated. He hands me something to read she allegedly wrote and it’s the words to James Brown’s King Heroin with the word meth substituted for heroin. He is from Wyoming where he lost a lung and got hooked himself—tells me it’s an epidemic there. After Phoenix he ended up with his sister in San Diego. Now he has just there left to join his dad in Oregon. I love him as does everyone nearby.
At Eugene I get off for fresh air and sadly find the natural foods restaurant near the station is just closing. I find a deserted spot to smoke in the cool crisp sunshine—so this is Eugene. Great cold water after the stale stuff I drink from a dispenser on the train—save me Virgin Mary through your prayers. Getting back on board I meet Aaron from Victoria, BC and we sit together a while onboard. He helps me to relax about crossing the border with my small stash by telling me what it will be like—no dogs. After a night of just deep rest crammed-in with the cowboy, I get at last an hour’s sleep. Then I can hold out no longer and I waste money on train fare in the dining car. At first I have to wait and start to feel sickly. Then the smiling black porter mafia leader who annoys us every hour shilling seats in a pseudo-DJ tone motions me over. He seats me with a slightly hostile bourgeois black girl. I must admit I feel and must look a bit bleary. After my blood pressure meds and a beer with the food (baked cod, rather dry), I’m better. We warmed up a bit and were joined by a young handsome Canadian American journalist, someone apparently more to her liking. And happily he seems to find me interesting. There’s a definite class distinction between sleeper and coach passengers. A young professional, she may have begrudged the black staff for seating her with me. To my mind it is a reflection on her quite more than on myself. That’s the train life apparently. Plus the beer after the earlier krispie treat puts me in Oscar Wilde form. They leave abruptly after finishing—I find the dining scene an odd ritual I resolve to avoid especially within the United States.

Friday, 18th. At long last the rail portion of the night’s journey is through. Jennifer, who restores Buddhist temples and who is an artist in her own right, guides me along. Seattle is glimpsed by night, no sign of the Space Needle, as we board a bus that will take us to a customs stop and then onto Vancouver. I am able to maintain fairly well through this relying on my sweet older guy disposition and not worrying about the cassette box full of smokes in my front pocket.
I also keep my traveler’s checks there. My tickets are in my coat’s breast pocket and my birth certificate in the pocket of my moleskin journal. The Canadian customs guys are much sterner than the friendly guy who let my brother and I drive right into Canada with minimal scrutiny in 1972. He asks me why I am traveling to Massachusetts. I tell him I need to see to family business-- my Mother went into an old folks’ home and the family home was sold. He waves me on. There had been a tattooed young man with us on board who made a joke about pound of dope. I told him not to even joke—a sense of humor, that’s a 20th Century thing. Well everyone gets back on the bus except for him at first. Then they let him through and I pat him on the back. It seems he’s an active serviceman and they are beginning to see deserters from the Iraqi theater heading for Canada. Lots of jest amid the relieved and weary passengers as we traverse the empty streets toward Vancouver train station.
It’s a lovely station too and it’s fast good-byes everyone scrambles to grab taxis. I had aimed for a hotel with low rates I’d seen in a guide book. But a friendly local lady from the train says it’s a grungy neighbor hood and that I should go to my second choice the YMCA despite its higher rates. I heed her advice but neglect my mental note to call first. At nearly 3 AM a Indian cab driver whisks me away toward the high rise downtown. At the YMCA I forget the exchange rate and even tip him too much on top of it. He races off and when I get to the door I see the “no vacancy” sign. So it’s back on the street reluctant to flag another cab and be charged to figure out where to go.
I see a bearded guy in a Black leather coat and ask him for directions. As we talk five angry young Asian guys approach us downhill. One kicks over a news stand in our direction. “Easy does it,” I say never losing my cool. The other guy starts trading comments with them and I ask him to knock it off--I have all my valuables and don’t feel like a fight.
They leave and I listen to what turns out to be another bum steer. He tells me there’s a YWCA within walking distance. I had read about a really nice one in Vancouver so I set off downtown. I stop to ask another guy why he’s videotaping empty streets at this hour. He’s from the local TV station and he’s waiting for a cinema to let out the first viewers from a midnight show of the new Harry Potter movie. It gets weirder as I pass furtive looking street people and walk into a financial district. I find what turns out to be merely offices of the YMCA--no hotel. Next door is a very expensive-looking Fairmont Hotel that I know better to even attempt. Up a side street I see the St. Regis a quaint looking hotel that I may be able to afford. The guy meets me in the doorway and says there’s no available rooms. At the least, he helps by directing me to Grandville Avenue where there are numerous hotels.
Getting there is again somewhat risky but fortunately the drunk and underworld types I pass by see me as suitably questionable myself. Here there are recently closed for the evening rock clubs and assorted dives still attracting stragglers. I try one hotel but it’s somewhat expensive so I shove off. Next I enter a side street sports-theme Day’s Inn lobby. A complete dump the guy still wants a high rate. I say, “For a noon checkout?!” He obviously doesn’t want me to stay and says “Eleven!” As I leave I say, “This is some kind of prostitution place.” He grins in apparent agreement. My fortune changes with my next try—a high rise Howard Johnson’s on lower Grandville. After a scrimmage at the desk I go up to the rather agreeable room—nice furnishings, cable TV, even a coffee maker with good coffee. I adjust to the place after a shower there is an urban humming outside as I fall asleep at last at four AM.