The St. Louis Chapter’s second To the Capitol…By Private Car trip was so popular that we had to charter two private sleeping cars.  In addition to our favored car, the ex-Frisco 14-4 sleeper Cimarron River, we added the former Union Pacific 10-6 sleeper Pacific Union for the trip, allowing comfortable accommodations for our 30 passengers. 

We departed St. Louis for Chicago late on the afternoon of Wednesday, June 4, arriving late that evening.  The heavy rains that the Midwest had been experiencing in June caused some concerns.  It was not known until the afternoon of our departure whether we would be taking our scheduled train, the Cardinal, out of Chicago to Washington or if we would be put on the Capitol Limited.  Both eastbound trains were running very late causing a concern for turning the equipment and departing again for Washington.  In the end Amtrak put together a Cardinal using spare cars and borrowing a sleeper from the Lake Shore Limited. 

The journey to Washington through scenic West Virginia and Virginia was everything we expected.  We arrived Friday evening a few hours late into Washington Union Station (also expected) but Amtrak quickly had us parked for the weekend. 

The passengers enjoyed two and a half days of exploring Washington DC and the surrounding area.  As we had experienced in 2007 the temperatures were in the mid-to-upper 90s but passengers shrugged it off and enjoyed the weekend. 

We departed Washington behind the Capitol Limited on Monday afternoon.  We were delayed the next morning in Cleveland due to a tornado-caused freight train derailment east of Toledo.  After sitting at Cleveland for about three hours we departed on a detour route via the former New York Central to Greenwich, Ohio and then on the ex-Baltimore & Ohio route through Willard to Fostoria, where we turned north toward Toledo on the former Chesapeake & Ohio line.  Our eventual arrival in Chicago was approximately eight hours late. 

We arrived back in St. Louis early in the afternoon of Wednesday the 11^th, concluding an excellent week-long trip.