After going through several options, for this year’s summer vacation we decided to go to Memphis, TN. This time we will travel by train. It was also more convenient for Emil since he didn’t have to drive and therefore can enjoy the trip without worrying about traffic and parking. We were going to have a lot of fun!
This train trip is actually my idea. I thought it would be fun to see the view during the ride (even though, in reality we don’t always get what we want because we ended up traveling at night). In the beginning, we only wanted to go somewhere close, like Chicago, St Louis or Indiana but somehow the plan evolved until we finally chose to go to Tennessee, a 14-hour trip from Madison (including the bus trip from Madison to Chicago). The good thing is we could rent a family bedroom in the train while it wasn’t acceptable for a short (less than 8 hours) trip.
On the way to M.Union
Emil queued at the counter
The vacation began at Thursday afternoon. We took a bus to Memorial Union to catch our 2.30 pm bus to Chicago. Dylan found this interesting, since he didn’t have to sit on the car seat and ride with so many people on the bus. Btw, this was his first time to ride a bus and later… the train. We arrived at Chicago Union Station at 7.30 pm, an hour late from schedule because of the traffic. Almost as soon as we arrived Emil started queuing at the counter to try to get a room for us. It was a long line. The reason for this is when Emil made a reservation for the round trip ticket online he could not get a room for the Chicago – Memphis section because all of the family bedrooms were sold out. They did have a smaller room but since we’re a family of three, the room was too small for us. We’re lucky enough to get a room on the way back but still wanted to push our luck by trying to buy the room to Memphis directly at the counter station. Unfortunately, all the train room to Memphis was sold out except the big bedroom, which costs an additional $376. Because of this, we decided to just use our reserved coach seats which turn out very comfortable with wide space and leg rest.
We arrived in Memphis at 6.27 am. Dylan was so amazed and kept asking about how we are suddenly at Memphis while he didn’t recognize anything (well, probably because he was asleep all the way there! Later this will be one of his five favorite things on this trip 
). After we cleaned up, we left our luggage at the Amtrak passenger service (our train back to Madison would be at 10.30 pm that night) and had breakfast at a restaurant just across the street… let the adventure begin!
Memphis Jones from The Memphis Mojo tour
Beale Street
Memphis trolley
We bought a Memphis trolley day pass for our transportation while we’re there (Dylan got the pass for free!) and ride along the Main Street to discover the city before taking the city tours. Our first tour started at 10.15 am, we went sightseeing all over the city, from the Peabody hotel to Graceland. It was an enjoyable tour. We stopped by at the Peabody hotel to watch the duck show, took pictures with Elvis & BB Kings statues, had lunch in Beale Street and played at FedEx Forum front yard. The tour ended at two o’clock. After that the bus dropped us at the Beale Street, a place where we will take the next tour. While waiting, we had snacks at Blues Café. Our next tour, The Memphis Mojo Tour was very unique because the tour guide was one of the talented Memphis musicians who told us historical events about Memphis while singing for us. As we expected, Dylan really enjoyed this one. He was more than happy to sing and shake the shaker to go along through the song with the entire tour audiences. Our tour guide musician, Memphis Jones was a funny man and a good singer! We loved it.
Memphis Arkansas Bridge
The tour ended at 5.00 pm. At that time, we still had at least four and a half hours more to explore the city. On the way to Main Street to catch the trolley, we stopped by at Starbucks and stayed there for a while. After that, we took a different trolley route to sightsee the Mississippi river and Memphis Arkansas Bridge from the trolley. I wish we could stop by at the river park but we were so hungry and we also needed to go to the souvenir shop. It was almost 9 o’clock when we finished our dinner at Wang Chinese bistro (the food was delicious!). Well, I guess it’s time to go back to the station, pick up our luggage and wait until the train comes. We’re finally on board the train at 11 o’clock. We were so tired but still managed to clean up first before we finally go straight to bed. I even had a chance to take a shower (Emil & Dylan decided to take a shower in the morning).
Our room
Arrived at Chicago
Chicago Union Station
I woke up in the morning while the attendant announced the last call for passengers to get a breakfast at the dining cars. I ordered us a breakfast and brought some back to our bedroom. Somehow, the waiter forgot to make a scramble egg that I ordered for Emil and made the hash brown instead. We arrived at Chicago Union Station at 10 am to catch the 11 o’clock bus to Memorial Union. We finally arrived home at 4 pm, Saturday, after we had a snack and ice cream in Union Terrace. It was a great trip. We’ll definitely do it again someday.
