Destination: Colorado

Movie: Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)

The Sound Track for this post:

Last week the road trip stopped in Utah, and this week we take up seamlessly where we left a plane crash in Northern Utah, as we watch Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, an oldie but still goodie.  The movie starts in Utah and then hops and skips to Colorado for the train sequences and back to Utah and back to Colorado (not to mention New Mexico and California) following the adventures of lovable bad guys played by Paul Newman and Robert Redford. The train is actually the Durango and Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad, and as a stop on your own road trip, you can ride on it–with no robberies along the way.

Durango and Silverton Narrow Gauge RR

Of course every reader of A Traveler’s Library has already seen the movie. Right? Well, I had not watched it for quite a few years, and I had actually forgotten how well the movie portrays the luscious western scenery.  If you can watch this movie and NOT want to travel (by road trip or on horseback, or train) to Colorado (and Utah and the West in general), perhaps you should schedule a neurological examination. There is something definitely wrong with your wiring!

One of the best things about  the west–you can watch a movie set in the 1890′s and today you can still see the same wide-open spaces and the same spectacular mountains and canyons, that these desperadoes rode across.

Even if the movie had no plot, a re-watch would be worth it to see the extended scene with Paul Newman riding around the ranch yard(sorry, that’s California) on a bicycle, sometimes with Katherine Ross on the handlebars, and the catchy tune Raindrops Keep Fallin’ On My Head in the background. (You’re singing it right now, aren’t you?)

And then there’s that unforgettable leap into the river from a cliff (in Colorado)–with better results than when Thelma and Louise drive over a Utah cliff in a later movie.

Jump!

According to Wikipedia, actors as diverse as Jack Lemmon and Marlon Brando were considered for roles, but these are the guys who made film history.

Redford and Newman as Butch and the Kid

Whew! Thank goodness it turned out to be the perfect film coupling–Paul Newman, as the nervous “thinker” who is smarter than the rest of the gang( but that’s nothing to brag about) and Robert Redford, the silent, moody and sometimes dense partner. Not only did it start Redford’s film career, but the pair went on to make several more movies together.

Sneffels Creek Canyon, Photo by Tom Harris, USFS

But mostly, I recommend looking at the film again so you can see that fantastic Western scenery. If you’ve never taken a road trip across Utah, Colorado, Wyoming and Montana, perhaps I need to explain that it really does look that spectacularly beautiful.

Pictures are from various sources, but the scenic canyon view is a Creative Commons picture from Flickr. Click on it to see the nice work of the photographer. And thanks, as usual to You Tube for always coming through with the right film clip.

AND THAT, MY FRIENDS, IS POST #500!

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Book: Kiss the Sunset Pig (2006) by Laurie Gough

A GUEST POST by Claire Algarme

It is a smooth ride along California Interstate-5 while I gaze out at the beautiful landscape before me. I am on a thruway bus going to Bakersfield where I will ride the Amtrak. My friends think I am out of my mind by taking the train to San Francisco — all by myself — when it was only my first time in California, let alone in the United States.

Travel Tips

I wanted to see the American countryside and explore the state beyond the big cities, like L.A. and San Francisco. Which leads me to the book Kiss the Sunset Pig, wherein the author, Laurie Gough, drove all the way from Canada across the US towards the Golden State, her dream hometown.

The words Kiss the Sunset Pig were part of the lyrics of the song California by Joni Mitchell that had caught the attention of our author.

I got hooked by Gough’s stories  of  surviving the American roads with her car Marcia as her constant companion and heading to that peaceful place inside the cave along a Californian beach where she retreated and found herself. Along the way, she sidetracked on her travels around the world to places like Greece, Indonesia, Korea, and Thailand.

Her first chapter was dated June 20, 1998, the day she left Guelph, Ontario, Canada for California. It was my birthday. I, on the other hand, had left the Philippines and headed to California on June 20, 2009, eleven years after.

But I wanted the parallelism not just to end there. Something within me yearned to imitate the adventures of Gough, but with my limited time, area, and resources, I was content to have my own American road experience within the boundaries of California.

What piqued my interest was when she wrote at the beginning of her book, “Most of the California coast is rugged and undeveloped. People don’t realize that. They associate California with L.A. But so much of the state is wilderness. It’s full of scenic beauty.”

And when she finally arrived at her destination, Gough’s words were,

Just the name California inspires amazement around the world. The name sizzles, holds magic, makes people think this is where my life should be taking place. I want to see all of this thousand-mile empire’s wildly disparate sites: the mountains, the desert, the small coastal and valley towns, the sea pounding the ocher sandstone cliffs, the fog floating through redwood rifts, the lonely twisting Joshua trees, the artichoke farmers in their fields, the Chamber of Horror rides at beach amusement parks, the movie stars wandering aisles of gourmet food stores, the crazy people, the creative people, the extraterrestrial and regular people – the many worlds within California. California, where the intensity of the environment matches that of the people.

From the picturesque scene outside the window, I focused myself on the ladies seated across from my train seat. They chatted animatedly, including me in their conversation. We were all strangers that happened to share a train table. They were Californians and their enthusiasm affected me. I understood why Gough was attracted to California, the place and the people.

Claire Algarme keeps a blog First-time Travels which features her first-time visits and travel experiences in various places, including destinations around her own country, the Philippines. If she’s not working or traveling, she spends her time reading books and magazines.

Thank you Claire for telling us about Kiss the Sunset Pig. You let us see the excitement of the first time in a new place!

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Waiting for a Train

Destination: Anywhere the train goes

Book: Waiting on a Train: The Embattled Future of Passenger Rail Service by James McCommons (released Nov.5)

My brother-in-law, Wayne Price is a foamer. My sister doesn’t deny it, although he might. I know that he has filled an entire room with an exquisite miniature railroad, all scenery made by hand, and I know that he reads several train magazines and even wrote an article for one, but I would never have called him a foamer, had it not been for this new book. Professional railroad men designate people who are avid fans of railroads and railroading–somewhat in the nature of trainspotters in England–foamers (as in foaming at the mouth–a bit mad). This is an example of the delightful detail James McCommons entertains us with while he is educating us about railroads in the United States. You might call this a road trip for trains, and definitely a travel guide book to the best and worst of American train rides.

So naturally, when the publishers sent me a review copy of Waiting on a Train, I sent it on to Wayne for an expert opinion. As you will see in this excerpt from his note to me, he liked the book, but to prove he is a foamer–he found an error.

“The author uses a good style of relating his travel experiences and weaving in the history, both old and more recent of the particular rail line that he is riding,” Wayne writes. “He lets the reader draw conclusions about the problems with passenger rail service and how they evolved. He doesn’t really discuss his opinions until the Epilogue, although I expected the conclusions he reached. The primary reason for the declining rail service in some areas is funding and the fact that the federal government has supported air and auto travel, but not rail. This was the case before Amtrak and has generally continued since Amtrak was created during the Nixon administration.”

” There is new optimism under the Obama administration and the funds that have been allocated to high speed rail in the Stimulus package.” [Note: See tomorrow's post here with links to several interesting train articles, including one about President Obama's plan for trains. VMB]

Wayne continues: “Several states are ahead of the curve and ready to invest state funds, with the federal funds that that are now becoming available to create regional transit projects that will be linked by Amtrak. California, Washington, Illinois, and the Northeast Corridor are the areas with shovel-ready projects that should benefit the most. One of the best success stories related to rail travel is Amtrak’s Downeaster between Boston and Portland Maine. Patricia Quinn is the executive director of the organization responsible for the Downeaster which is heavily funded by Maine and Massachusetts. This is an example of the funding partnership that is necessary to make rail travel a viable part of the overall transportation solution.”

And here comes the kind of detail that foamers relish: “I found only two errors; on pages 98 and 261 he refers to the Richmond depot as ‘Stafford Mills’. In reality it is ‘Staples Mills’.”

Despite my kidding Wayne about his near-obsession, I appreciate very much his taking time to share his thoughts. If you are looking for a really good travel book that will inspire you to look into American rail travel, this is the one.

Photo attribution: Creative Commons

The Internet Review of Books has a particularly good review of Waiting on a Train, if you would like to read more about this road trip book by train. And please come back tomorrow for an update on latest news on trains and train travel. Challenge: Where does the title of the book come from?

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