A Summer Trip in Style: Go Tell It on the Mountain
By Kelly Kearsley, The News Tribune, Tacoma, Wash.
Jun. 23–If you’re taking a train almost to the mountain, there are worse ways to go.
A luxury passenger train chugged into Tacoma’s Freighthouse Square on Friday, completing the first of 10 trips from Tacoma to Eatonville that the train will make this summer.
Colorado-based GrandLuxe Rail Journeys signed a contract with Tacoma Rail’s Mountain Division to use its tracks toward Mount Rainier as part of a nine-day tour the company offers of Northwest national parks.
Passengers pay an average $5,000 each for the trip, which begins in Jackson, Wyo., and tours Yellowstone and Glacier national parks before heading west toward Puget Sound. Other trips will begin in Tacoma and run the same route in reverse.
Though Tacoma bought rail tracks more than a decade ago with the hopes of creating a “Train to the Mountain,” the cost of upgrading tracks all the way to Mount Rainier has stalled the project.
This summer’s use of the tracks by GrandLuxe and the Spirit of Washington dinner train are lending the project some momentum. The latter company announced last week that it will run dinner trains from Freighthouse Square to Lake Kapowsin beginning in August.
GrandLuxe and Tacoma Rail staff members deemed this week’s maiden voyage a general success.
The 2,000-foot luxury train rolled slowly into Eatonville early Thursday. The condition of the tracks kept the train from going much faster than 10 miles per hour — to keep the ride from getting too rough, GrandLuxe staff said.
Clois Kicklighter and his wife, both of Naples, Fla., were on their second GrandLuxe trip.
“You see more on a train than in a car,” he said. “You see a lot of the country and you have everything taken care of for you.”
The train’s 21 cars — restored luxury passenger cars from the 1940s and ’50s — include glass-domed lounges and dining cars that serve five-course meals and the occasional high tea. A grand piano stands in one car, and polished wood and large flower arrangements adorn most of the public spaces.
In Eatonville, passengers picked a range of day trips, from sightseeing at Mount Rainier and Northwest Trek to visiting Seattle or Bainbridge Island. They left the train in the morning and returned in time for dinner — a choice of filet mignon, lobster or game hen.
For $5,000 you can expect good service.
Patti Aslett, the train’s general manager, hopped off the train in Eatonville in search of some Dom Perignon champagne for her passengers with more discerning taste.
“We went all over looking for some Dom,” she said.
Aslett’s quest finally succeeded in Lacey, where she bought out a store’s stock of the high-end champagne.
GrandLuxe will pay Tacoma Rail to use the tracks — about $3.50 per mile per car. The revenue will amount to about $120,000 for the summer, said Chris Gleason, spokeswoman for Tacoma Public Utilities.
Sergio Portillo, GrandLuxe’s vice president of transportation, said the company intends to pursue a 10-year contract for the use of the tracks.
In Eatonville, town leaders hope the Grand Luxe and the Spirit of Washington deliver some economic benefit along with the hundreds of tourists.
In small ways it already has — the railway hired a young local man to wash the train’s windows each time it comes to town. The train also requires local water, trash and septic services.
Larger plans include trying to offer GrandLuxe more local tour options and enticing the company to buy food and produce from local suppliers, said David Hymel, vice president of the Greater Eatonville Chamber of Commerce.
“You have quite a nexus of rail opportunities that come together (in Eatonville) as a rail destination and transportation hub,” Hymel said. “It really creates some economic potential for that part of Pierce County.”
more online
For more information on the GrandLuxe Rail Journeys train and to sign up for trips, go to americanorientexpress.com.
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Copyright (c) 2007, The News Tribune, Tacoma, Wash.
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